Naruto: The Storm
by 6Vor6kas6
Summary: Naruto understood what it meant to be a ninja. Now, wielding the powers of the storm, he must come forth into his destiny. Semi-genius, powerful Naruto.
1. Prologue

Disclaimer: If I owned Naruto, It would have never reached that kind of recognition, because frankly I suck at writing! Anyway, I don't own Naruto.  
>Alright this fic will have a lot of gore and blood at later chapters, so I advise you not to read if you don't like that kind of stuff, or prepare yourselves for what is to come.<p>

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><p>Naruto Uzumaki was not in a good mood. He was late for his academy exams, that would finally promote him to gennin rank, and he could finally start his journey to complete his life-long dream of becoming Hokage. Only then could he gain the recognition and respect he wanted, and he would no longer be subject to the harsh and uncaring looks of the villagers. To make matters worse he had just run out of instant ramen today and he hadn't had any money to get ramen from Ichiraku's or get some overpriced instant ramen from the only groceries store that would sell anything to him.<p>

He was lost in his train of thought when he noticed he had been running in the wrong street all along. He started cursing at his bad luck and started running high speed towards the Academy.

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><p>Iruka Umino was currently watching over his students, waiting for his last student to arrive. Naruto was late, like every day for the 2 years he had him as a student. Iruka sighed; he would just have to start the day without Naruto.<p>

At that moment the whole class heard a loud crash just outside the class door.

"YOU BRAT"

"Sorry!"

The class door opened and Naruto poked his head through.

"Sorry I'm late Iruka-sensei, but I kind of overslept" said Naruto, with a sheepish look on his face.

"Ugh..Fine, this is the last time I will tolerate this" Iruka sighed

"Of course it's the last time Iruka-sensei, after all today is the day I get promoted to gennin, finally!"

At that moment the class woke from their shocked state and started laughing.

"You'll never become a ninja, you dead last!" Kiba shouted while hitting his hand on the table.

"I'll show you all!" said Naruto.

"Alright class settle down, you all have no right to put any student down. We are ninjas; you never know who might surprise you!"Iruka said "Now let's get these tests over with already, I have the third graders tests to go through by tonight..."

All other tests were finished, and it was all down to the ninjutsu test. Naruto had flunked some of the tests, specifically the anatomy, written, and genjutsu tests but had passed with medium to good grades on the taijutsu and survival tests. For Naruto to pass he had to successfully pass the ninjutsu test.

Student by student, everyone's names were called out, until Naruto's name was called.

Naruto entered the room, looking nervous. He looked at Mizuki and Iruka and nodded at them, saying that he was ready.

"Ok Naruto, all I need you to perform the 3 basic academy jutsus, which we've been going through all of this year. Let's start off with the _kawarimi no jutsu_. Can you please substitute yourself with any object in this room?"

"Alright" Naruto said while snickering.

He performed the necessary handseals and then stated the jutsus name.

A large crash followed and after the smoke cleared, they saw that Naruto had replaced himself with Mizuki's chair. Mizuki was on the floor, trying to figure out what had happened, while Naruto was snickering in the back.

"Very funny Naruto, now can you please give Mizuki his chair back and carry on with your exam?"

"Ugh..fine!"

Once Mizuki was settled back in his seat, Iruka motioned for Naruto to continue.

"Now I want you to perform the _henge no jutsu_. No naked girls this time."

"Alright"

Naruto then henged into a regular old lady, complete with a bag of groceries.

"Very good Naruto, I'm almost ready to walk you across the street" Iruka laughed while Naruto had a grin plastered on his face at the praise.

"On to the last jutsu, could you please perform the _Bunshin no Jutsu_? It also is a requirement to have 2 or more normal looking clones as a result." said Iruka, while giving Naruto a concerned look.

Naruto had gone white from Shock. 'The clone jutsu? SHIT, that's my worst jutsu. I will have to try though, it's just an obstacle on my way to becoming Hokage."

Naruto started charging chakra, the chakra quickly becoming visible while it was spinning around him. The Hokage paintings on the back of the room started swaying back and forth, showing the blowing force of Naruto's chakra

"Bunshin no jutsu!"

Smoke gathered around Naruto, and when it cleared it revealed Naruto standing amongst a normal looking clone, and one that looked quite dead, sitting on the floor.

Iruka face faulted at that.

"I'm sorry Naruto, but it looks like I'll have to fail you. Maybe if you would practice your chakra control more, you could try again next year?" Iruka said with a sad look.

"Maybe.." drawled Naruto while walking with his head down ,going for the exit.

"Come on Iruka, we have to finish these exams soon."

"YAMANAKA, please step forward into the room!"..

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><p>Naruto was sitting on his regular spot on a swing under a tree, facing the academy. He was watching all his classmates being congratulated by their parents for passing the exams. He was about to jump of the swing and run away when a shadow covered his view. Naruto looked up and said:<p>

"Oh, it's you."

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><p>Hiruzen Sarutobi, The Third Hokage, was finishing up his last paperwork for the day. His everyday demon continued to plague him, even into the night. He was about to stamp the last paper, and finally be over with it, when one of his ANBU barged in to his office breaking his door.<p>

"Hokage-sama, Naruto has stolen the Forbidden scroll!"

"WHAT?" 'Oh.. Naruto, this time you've gone too far, I don't know how I will be able to get you out of this one.' "Dispatch all available chuunin and above. Tell them to bring Naruto to me UNHARMED."

"Hai!"

Hiruzen went to his office and picked up his crystal ball. He then synchronized his chakra with the chakra machines in the ball and set on to find Naruto with his mind.

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><p>Naruto was currently jumping top speed on the branches in a forest just close to Konoha's borders. Mizuki-sensei had said that he would find him in a small cottage by a river close to the village wall in that part of the forest.<p>

He found the cottage and sat down in front of it, opening the scroll and looking at the first jutsu in the list.

'Hm.._Kage Bunshin no Jutsu_, says here that this creates solid clones, and something that I can't understand. I'll have to ask Mizuki-sensei about that when he comes'

Naruto got to work on learning the new jutsu.

Iruka was heading towards where he sensed Naruto's chakra trail to have gone. That was how he always found Naruto when he went on his prank sprees. He landed in a clearing and saw Naruto looking at him with a shocked look, scratches adorning his face and hands, as he seemed to have been training.

'This isn't just some prank, he has been training. That could mean either good or bad, depending on which jutsu he decided to train, from the FORBIDDEN SCROLL of all things.'

"Alright Naruto, you're coming with me, the Hokage has sent out specific orders that you answer to him once you are found."

"What do you mean Iruka-sensei; don't you first have to check to see if I learned the jutsu I was supposed to? Isn't that how the secret test works?"

"What are you talking about Naruto, what secret test; have you been drinking expired milk again?" Iruka said with a certain look "I told you a million times to check the expiration date before buying something."

"Look, that was a onetime thing ok? I told you it won't happen again. Anyway, Mizuki-sensei told me about the secret test, you know, where I have to stealth through the Hokage building, get the Forbidden scroll then meet you guys here to deliver the scroll, after I had learned one of the techniques in the scroll"

"Naruto, there is no such thing as a…"  
>Iruka was interrupted when he heard the sound of something slicing through the air. Using his trained reflexes, he grabbed the object, which turned out to be a giant shuriken. Then using the shuriken's momentum he span and threw the shuriken back to the direction it came from with increased speed.<p>

He heard the sound of metal hitting wood, and then he saw a log falling on the ground.

'Substitution!' he thought.

"What do we have here? Iruka! What are you doing with the class's dead last?

"Mizuki! Just what the hell is going on?" Iruka yelled.

"This was all part of my genius plan to frame that little demon over there, while also getting the extremely powerful techniques inside the forbidden scroll. Then, I could finally be able to defeat any one in my path and I will no longer be some unrecognizable chuunin. I will be feared in all of the elemental countries."

"But Mizuki; what happened to our friendship, what happened to loyalty to the village and its laws?" Iruka said in shock.

"To hell with them all! In the end, power is the only thing that matters!"Mizuki laughed "So tell me Naruto, have you ever wondered why everyone hates you? Why everyone looked at you with hate filled eyes while they ignored your miserable existence? Why all the teachers at the academy, minus Iruka, went out of their way to stunt your growth, so you would get killed on your first dangerous mission as a ninja?"

Naruto nodded fearfully, that question always floating around his mind, but at the same time being too afraid of the answer.

"It's because you're the demon!" he laughed "You're the demon that attacked the village 12 years ago! Your true name is Kyuubi; you're just a demon in disguise!"

Naruto's eyes widened at that. He was about to run away when he heard.

"He's not the demon! He is Naruto Uzumaki, a proud ninja of Konohagakure no Sato. Jinchuuriki like him are always feared throughout the elemental countries, not for what they hold, but for their own immense power and smarts. Naruto is destined to become great, even Hokage, and he will be able to overcome peoples mistrust, fear and hate, with his deeds towards the village."

"You're just a fool Iruka, like that precious Hokage of yours!" Mizuki grinned evilly. "NOW DIE!" he shouted while he threw his second giant shuriken.

Iruka knew he would be able to catch the shuriken and was about to when an orange mass covered his view from the shuriken  
>"Iruka-sensei!" Naruto shouted.<p>

The shuriken hit Naruto dead on the chest. Mizuki's eyes widened for a moment before he started laughing at Naruto's foolish move.

"Naruto! No!" All of Iruka's feelings about the blonde troublemaker started surfacing as tears streamed down his face.

Just then Naruto's body poofed out of existence and white smoke rose from the spot he was on.

'What! A clone? When did Naruto learn to do that?' Iruka thought.

Naruto came to stand in front of Iruka, blocking him from Mizuki's point of view. He laughed and pointed towards Mizuki.

"Did you think that I had not learned anything from the scroll? Kage bunshin no jutsu was the first jutsu in the list so I naturally picked that first. Now come Mizuki-teme. Throw everything you want at me. I will throw it back a thousand fold." Said Naruto, with a determined look. He then put his hands on a cross shaped hand sign, and started charging his chakra, until a cocoon of chakra formed around him, the chakra spinning wildly around him.

"_KAGE BUNSHIN NO JUTSU_" he shouted, releasing all his chakra in one shot.

Clone after clone, the large clearing was filled to the brim with Naruto's clones. Mizuki was eyeing them all with fear clear in his eyes.

"Now, Mizuki-teme. Why don't you go ahead and attack my sensei again? Only then will you feel my true rage!" Naruto said with a serious look "Clones, Attack!"

The clones all pulled out a kunai from their kunai pouch and threw them at Mizuki. Now a couple of kunai wouldn't have Mizuki worried. But when a thousand kunai where coming at him fast, he was worried.

He was saved when a seal was thrown between him and suddenly he heard a jutsu being called by many people at once.

"Impenetrable Barrier" An orange shield rose around him, deflecting all kunai and making them fall on the ground, harmless. Just as he was about to comment on that, he was surrounded by ten Anbu and he saw the Sandaime standing next to Iruka and Naruto.

"I'm sorry about the interruption but I couldn't let young Naruto get his hands dirty so young, with blood so foul. Anbu take him away!"

Now Iruka, Naruto how about we go into my office. We have some things to discuss."

"Hai, sir." Saluted Iruka. "Oh by the way, Naruto. Why don't you close your eyes for a moment"

"What for Iruka-sensei?"

"Just do it, baka!"

Naruto's world got dark for a few moments, as he felt Iruka pushing something soft on his forehead.

"You can open your eyes now, Naruto"

Naruto opened his eyes, and found himself looking at a smiling Iruka and a grinning Sandaime. Then he noticed that Iruka was missing his forehead Protector. He gently touched his forehead, and felt the cold feeling of the metal against his hand. He traced the Konoha symbol on the middle of the metal plate while tears started to glister at the corner of his eyes

"Iruka-sensei!" He shouted while giving the man a bear hug. Iruka fell down from the shock and his lack of strength from having a long day, giving the impression that Naruto was glomping him.

"Naruto! You're suffocating me!" He laughed, with a little seriousness in his voice.

'It looks like Naruto is finally being accepted, even with a small band of friends, consisting of Teuchi, Ayame and Iruka. Slowly but surely, you will be accepted as a hero, my boy' The Sandaime smiled at his own thoughts.

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><p>So this is the first chapter. I thought it was appropriate to end the chapter at this part since its only an introduction, and it was the best part to end his.<p>

Stay tuned for more!  
>~6Vor6kas6<p> 


	2. Elements

Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto.

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><p>Naruto was currently sitting outside the Hokage's office while Iruka briefed the Sandaime on what had occurred during Mizuki's betrayal. At the moment he was feeling both tired, and shocked about what he had learned a few hours before. His rage against the villagers had left his mind, and Understanding had taken place. Naruto was quite smart, but he didn't show it, preferring on keeping the goofy attitude as a front, as it seemed to attract more attention than him being smart and knowing stuff.<p>

He was lost in his thoughts when he heard the door click and saw Iruka walking out of the office.

"The Hokage would like to see you Naruto"

"Alright Iruka-sensei" Naruto smiled

He took a few steps towards the door while Iruka walked in the opposite direction.

"Oh, and Naruto? Thanks for err… Saving me back there" Iruka said with a sheepish grin

"You don't have to thank me sensei, I'll always protect my precious people no matter what!"

Iruka looked at him with shocked eyes, before his lips stretched into a warm smile. Naruto didn't notice that though as he was already closing the door to the Hokage's office.

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><p>Hiruzen noticed Naruto coming in through the door. He took in his expression, stance, and how he was acting, and draw a conclusion that Naruto wasn't confused, nor was he blaming himself, rather, he was just shocked at what he had learned.<p>

"Sit down Naruto" He said warmly

"Now Naruto, can you explain to me what you heard from Mizuki in the forest?" said Hiruzen seriously.

"He said that I was the demon that attacked the village twelve years ago, he said that I was Kyuubi incarnate." He said looking down.

"I want you to understand that you are not the demon. You are merely a container, and you should not even be referred to as a container, only as Naruto Uzumaki."

"I know old man, I understood that myself, after I put some thought in it. I understand that the villagers where just scarred from the Kyuubi's attack and from their loss of their loved ones. They just needed a scapegoat to release all their frustration at, and because they knew that I contained the Kyuubi, they picked me."

"That's good Naruto. I was afraid you would be blaming yourself, or telling yourself that you are the demon." He said while Naruto shook his head.

"Alright Naruto, if you need anything else, tell me, if not, you're free to go" he said while leaning back in his chair and lighting up his pipe.

Naruto got up, and went for the door his head looking down, in thought. He paused with his hand on the door knob, staying there for a moment, before turning his head to look at Hiruzen, directly in the eyes.

"Actually there is something"

"What do you need, my boy?" said Hiruzen.

"While I was reading about the Kage Bunshin, there was one part that I didn't understand. Something about fragments of the mind and soul, and memories."

Hiruzen smiled

"It seems you have discovered the true purpose of the Kage Bunshin, Naruto-kun. Kage Bunshin was initially used for spying purposes. Kage Bunshin took a lot of chakra, but also a small piece of the creators mind, and soul to create. That way, the clones could keep the entire user's memories, and skills, in case they got caught. But slowly, when clones where dispelled by sensors, users noticed that they retained the clone's memories of what happened. The small piece of their mind and soul, went right back into them, along with the clones memories. Anything the clone learned, including chakra manipulation, and jutsus, was present in their head. The only thing that didn't transfer was body strength. Now that I think about it, I saw you create hundreds of clones in that clearing. Just think of the possibilities, if you had all those clones training at the same thing. You could finish an exercise in a day, while it normally would take you a week, and so on. "

Naruto's eyes widened in understanding, and he immediately turned the door knob.

"Thanks Hokage-ojii!" he yelled while running away.

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><p>Naruto was running through the streets, trying to find Iruka. He remembered Iruka mentioning something about chakra control to him, before he left the room, after he flunked his gennin test for the third time. He gazed at his right to see the Ichiraku ramen stand and a familiar figure sitting on one of the stools. He immediately turned and walked in the stand.<p>

"Hey Iruka-sensei, Ayame, Teuchi-ojii !"

"Ah Naruto/Naruto-kun" they exclaimed at the same time.

"What would you like to eat, Naruto" Teuchi continued.

"A large serving of miso ramen with roasted pork fillet, please, Teuchi-ojii!" he grinned.

"You never change, do you, Naruto" said Iruka, smiling. "So tell me Naruto where you looking for something? You sound rather tired, like you've been running or something."

"Actually yes, Iruka-sensei. While I was talking with the Hokage, he mentioned the uses of the Kage Bunshin, and how I could use it for training, due to the memory retaining. I remember you mentioned that if I improve my chakra control I could finally perform the Bunshin technique."

"Look Naruto, the bunshin technique is a fairly useless technique in front of the Kage Bunshin; you don't need to practice chakra control just for that technique. But, training chakra control would help you become a better ninja in general, as it would enable you to use much better techniques as well as nature manipulation." He said waving his sticks around to emphasize points in his speech.

"Nature manipulation?" he said, gazing at him questionably with the corner of his eyes while he was slurping ramen.

"Uh… You honestly didn't pay any attention in class did you?" said Iruka, getting his speech look, which Naruto knew all too well. "Nature manipulation is an advanced form of chakra control. One molds his chakra into an innate type of chakra nature, altering its properties and characteristics" he finished with a look.

"In simple words, you alter your chakra to match an element, which is directly tied to your chakra core. Few shinobi have more than two elements at their disposal, and having five elements is completely unheard of." He finished, proud that Naruto finally was paying attention to him, for once.

"So how do I know what my element is , Iruka-sensei?" said Naruto, finishing up his ramen, and putting it on top of the pile, making it a total of 8 ramen cups.

"That is achieved through the use of special chakra papers, which are made from chakra trees, which are grown and fed with chakra for years on end." He smiled "You know what; I have some at home with me, why don't you come over so we can see what your nature is. Food is on me tonight" he said as he threw a small bundle of ryo to a greedy looking Teuchi, having taken Naruto out for some food and company so many times that he knew the exact price of what they ate.

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><p>Iruka reached the door of his apartment, Naruto in tow. He took out his keys and opened the door, letting himself and Naruto in, before he closed it.<p>

"Ah, home sweet home." He sighed contently "Have a seat Naruto; I'll be right back with those chakra papers." He said, pointing to one of the blue chairs in the kitchen.

Naruto sat down while Iruka went to get the papers. He could hear Iruka rummaging around in his room, but he slowly faded the sounds out as he looked around. He could see pictures of Iruka with his parents, Iruka with his friends, and in front of them all, the most recent one, a picture with him during a night out they had two months before graduation, when Iruka wanted to make it up to Naruto for blaming him for a prank, which turned out to be Kiba's work. Naruto looked at the picture with widening eyes, before his expression turned to a warm, true smile.

"Hey Naruto, are you listening to me?"

"Huh?"

"I've been trying to get your attention for the last 3 minutes but you're just sitting there pretending that nothing is happening. Anyway I got those chakra papers for you. Take one from the bag, good, and now concentrate your chakra into the paper. The paper's state will change depending on your chakra nature. If it's lightning, it will wrinkle, if its wind, it will split in two, if its water it'll get wet, if its earth it will turn to dust and crumble away, and if its fire, it will ignite and then turn to ash. Now try it for yourself."

Naruto pushed his chakra into the paper, closing his eyes as he concentrated. When he opened them, he first looked at Iruka's face, which held a shocked expression. He then slowly turned to look at the paper.

The paper had split in two, and the two parts had gotten wet. Everything seemed normal, but if u paid attention to the paper, you could see that it was slowly wrinkling, and trails of lightning could be seen travelling around the paper.

"What does this mean Iruka sensei? Do I have three chakra types?" he said, looking at Iruka.

"It certainly means that you have an affinity to Water, Wind, and Lightning, that's for sure. I remember reading about that specific combination once. I will have to research that soon, but I promise I'll get back to you with my research results, if I find anything. For now, let me get an empty scroll and write down some basic Jutsu for each element, along with the nature manipulation exercises you need to perform the jutsu, and the two basic chakra control exercises. You have one week until the genin teams are assigned, so work hard to learn at least one of the jutsu, along with the nature manipulation exercise of the respective element, and one of the chakra control exercise. Remember what the Sandaime said about Kage Bunshin. Since it's the first time I instruct anyone to three of those elements, I can only give you hints on the water manipulation, which is pretty common for a lot of kunoichi to have, and I have instructed a lot of young kunoichi in water manipulation. For Lightning manipulation, you'll have to find someone that is at least proficient in it. The only one I can think of is Kakashi Hatake, the copy ninja. Wind manipulation is even rarer than Lightning manipulation in Konoha. In fact, the only one in the village that can manipulate wind at the moment is Asuma Sarutobi, the Sandaime's son." He said thoughtfully. "I'll be right back with that scroll." He said as he headed towards the small library in the living room, which he started to rummage to find the scroll he needed.

"There we go" he took out a medium sized scroll, along with some writing supplies. He sat next to Naruto, and proceeded to write with practiced ease, finishing up quickly, before throwing it to Naruto, who caught it with a surprised look on his face. He was expecting at least double the time it took Iruka to write that.

"Thanks a lot Iruka-sensei. I'll let you know on my progress or if I need anything. For now, its getting late, and I should be going to bed soon, if I'm going to wake up early to train." Naruto concluded. "See ya tomorrow!" he yelled as he ran out, waving his hand above his head as he jumped above the railing.

Iruka looked at his back with a warm smile 'It looks like Naruto is finally growing up, even if a little.' He thought as he closed the door and switched off the light.

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><p>Again, it was most appropriate for the chapter to end here. Sorry if it's a little short.<br>Next Chapter: Start of training.  
>Also, I found it logical to have 1 week until genin teams are assigned.<br>~6Vor6kas6


	3. Chakra Control, and equipment

I've made some changes to the Naruto-Iruka meeting in his house in chapter two, check that out to get updated, because I had made a serious mistake at one part and it needed to be fixed.

Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto.

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><p>The sun slowly rose above Konoha, signaling the start of yet another day. The villagers were still in their beds, few having a reason to be up at this hour. A lone figure was walking in the nearly empty streets. The few villagers that were out at the time, directed all the coldness they could muster at the figure, before continuing with their daily lives<p>

* * *

><p>'They're all the same, every last one of them. But that is going to change soon, once I become Hokage!'<p>

* * *

><p>Naruto was standing in an empty clearing, near the wall, at the edges of the forest inside Konoha. His eyes were running through the scroll Iruka wrote for him, reading about his first exercise.<p>

'Tree walking huh? Well there are lots of trees here so I might as well start.' He thought, his expression turning serious.

Chakra started emitting from him as he put his hands in the cross shaped hand sign, calling forth around three hundred clones.

"All right you guys, listen up! I'm guessing you picked up from my mind, what the exercise includes. Try not to dispel from falling as that defeats the purpose!" He yelled, his clones nodding as one.

They all picked out a tree, and stood facing it, before breaking into a run, all the while concentrating their chakra in their feet. All the clones took two steps on the tree bark, before slipping and landing headfirst into the ground. Thankfully the distance from the ground wasn't much so they didn't dispel.

Naruto looked at his clones moving up the trees, step by step. He picked out a tree, and proceeded to do the same thing as his clones, determined to finish the exercise.

* * *

><p>A few hours had passed since Naruto and his clones had been training in tree walking, and Naruto had made good progress on his own, his marks taking up a third of the tree. He decided it was time for him to dispel the clones and check on how much process he had made with three hundred clones memories aiding him. He concentrated and dispelled the clones in one go. He was about to run up the tree, but he realized his mistake as he stumbled, before falling headfirst on the ground.<p>

'My head feels like it's going to explode! Note to self, never dispel all of the clones at once.' He thought as he stopped and sat cross legged on the ground, holding his head in agony.

After a few minutes had passed, and the pain subsided, Naruto turned to look at the tree. He stood facing it, before breaking into a run. He easily passed his earlier mark, and kept going, finding that concentrating chakra on his feet had come without thought to him, and he could maintain it with no trouble. After a few moments of running he reached the peak of the tree, barely grabbing hold of it and stopped. His eyes widened as he realized that he had just completed the tree running exercise.

'No it can't be this simple, even with the clones helping me.' He thought in disbelief. 'There has to be something more that I didn't do. I won't move on to the next exercise if I don't do something that surpasses these limits.' He finished his thoughts with determination.

His expression a thoughtful one, he started thinking of ways to advance more in tree climbing. Then it dawned on him. Being able to focus your chakra into other parts of your body, like hands and generally everything, would be a way to test the tree climbing limits. Focusing chakra on your finger tips would also help immensely since they were such small parts to focus chakra in.

He charged up the same chakra he used to create the three hundred clones. Only this time, the number of clones even surprised him.

Five hundred clones were looking right back at him, some grinning, while others wore a serious expression.

'Damn, was I wasting so much chakra before?'

"All right guys, let's try something new, try to tree climb, using only your hands, without using your legs as support. First try to climb using your whole hand, but over time, once you get the hang of it, try to lessen the area you focus chakra in, until the only areas you focus chakra in are your fingertips!"

"Hai Boss!" they saluted.

Naruto joined the clones, taking a tree for himself. He walked up to it. He focused his chakra on his hands, seeing them glow with chakra. He pressed them on the tree until he felt them stick. He looked around and saw his clones doing the same thing. Determined, he moved his hand up. He then lifted himself and put his second hand above the first. He was now holding himself a few inches above the ground using nothing but his bare hands. Grinning, he started moving at a faster pace, hand after hand, until he had made it a third of the way to the top, when he slipped after his concentration broke.

'Wow, either working with hands is way easier than working with feet, or my chakra control really has improved that much.'

It was a little of both actually. Naruto started repeating the process, and each time, he went a little higher than the previous time, until he had made it to two thirds up the tree.

'Okay, it's time to try out my fingers.'

He concentrated his chakra, before moving it to go to his fingertips. He could feel that this was way harder than concentrating chakra on his feet, but he continued. He made his way on the tree before touching it with his finger tips. He repeated the process from before, putting one hand above the other. Only this time he only managed to do it until he was some inches above the ground. He then proceeded to fall on the ground, on his ass.

'Man, this is hard! I won't give up though.'

He looked around and saw that his clones were having trouble as well, some still trying to do it with their whole hands, while some had made it higher than him with their fingers.

'All right, let's do this!'

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><p>A few hours later, Naruto was standing with his fingers bleeding, after hours of rigorous training.<p>

He had made it a little over halfway up the tree, but he could feel his chakra touching bottom, so he decided to stop and go for lunch, since it was around three o' clock in the afternoon.

"All right you guys, dispel your selves!"

His clones all poofed away in a giant smoke cloud, making him cough. While he was coughing he stumbled and fell on the ground, laying there trying to stop the headache.

'I really need to remember not to dispel them all at once next time.'

Once his headache had gone down, Naruto sat cross legged on the ground, waiting for his fingers to heal, as they always did. Once they had healed as well, he looked at the tree once again.

'All right, one more go at this, and then I'm off to lunch'

He closed the distance to the tree, and then pressed his fingers on the bark. He started climbing, finding this a lot easier. He kept his pace, slowly increasing his speed, until he had made it up to three quarters to the top. He felt his concentration slip, but he grabbed a nearby branch to stop himself from falling. Bringing his feet up, he hung upside down, facing the ground. He then proceeded to jump and do what he thought was a graceful flip, which resulted in him ripping a part of his pants, as he slipped once he landed, and fell one the ground, ass first.

"No! These were the last pants I had! Shit!"

He had to take some money off his personal savings for dire situations, as this was considered a dire situation, due to the public embarrassment he would get if anyone saw him with his pants ripped, or even worse, if Sakura saw him with ripped pants, and buy some new clothes. Oh how he hated buying clothes. The only problem was finding a clothes shop that would sell to him.

* * *

><p>Iruka was getting ready to go to grab some lunch. He had had a relaxed day, only correcting some papers for young students, as the days before the gennin teams were assigned were considered holiday for all academy students, no matter the class.<p>

He was just about to open the door when it was swung aside by Naruto.

"Iruka-sensei! I need your help!"

"What do you need Naruto?"

"Erm... well, you know how villagers behave around me due to my condition right?"

"Yes" he narrowed his eyes. He had always thought it was unfair to behave like that, even when he hadn't known Naruto.

"Well, I kind of ripped my pants, and I don't have any left, but I know that any of the known clothes shops won't serve me, because of who I am, so I thought about coming to you to get me some clothes.

'Finally a chance to get him out of that horrid orange' he thought. "You know what, Naruto. I know of a place where they'll treat you the same way they treat any ninja, with the respect they deserve. It's a ninja only shop so no obnoxious villagers there to stop you from shopping. I believe you have noticed that only villagers treat you bad, the shinobi and kunoichi of our village see you as just another gennin graduate."

"All right Iruka-sensei, whenever you're ready, we can go, and then maybe we can grab some lunch?"

"Sure, why not" he exclaimed.

Naruto turned around and started to walk, and Iruka noticed that there was no sign of a rip on his pants. Reaching out with his chakra he noticed that Naruto was using a henge.

'My, I actually had to use my chakra to notice that he was a henge. No flickers or anything. He certainly trained this morning, like he told me. I'll ask him about it later.'

* * *

><p>Naruto was walking with Iruka; they had been walking for about ten minutes, and at the moment they were at the shinobi sector of the village. All the shops needed a shinobi id, or a shinobi accompanying you, and as Iruka was his first ninja friend, and he had just graduated from the academy so he hadn't had time to go and register for his shinobi id.<p>

They stopped in front of a shop that went by the name of 'Higurashi's Armory'.

"Is this the place, Iruka-sensei?"

"Hai, come with me" he said, before he pushed the door and entered the shop.

* * *

><p>Naruto and Iruka walked up to a counter where a girl was sitting. There was a door behind the counter, and they could hear the sounds of metal hitting metal coming from it. Naruto guessed that there was a blacksmith in the back that was fixing weapons or making new ones.<p>

"Hi, Iruka-sensei! How can I be of service?" the girl asked.

"My, Tenten, you've grown, I haven't seen you in months!" the girl grinned at that. "And actually yes, you can be of service! My student, and friend, Naruto here, wants to buy some new clothes and shinobi equipment since his is damaged. Can you help him?"

"Of course! Come this way!" she said, motioning for Naruto to follow her into the clothes section of the store.

"So, have you graduated yet?" she asked, eyeing him for the first time, giving his clothes a disgusted look before turning to look at the different clothes in the store.

"Actually yes, I just graduated yesterday, my gennin team assignments are in six days!"

"Ah, I remember those. It's actually a fond memory in my head now."

"You're a ninja?"

"Yes. For a year now."

"Cool, so you must be pretty strong!" he said, making Tenten blush. "Are you okay? You look like you have a fever or something!" he exclaimed, before putting his hand on her forehead to check her temperature.

"I don't!" she said, shoving his hand away. "Now, what exactly are you looking for?"

"Well something orange! Anything!"

"Are you serious? A ninja that wears orange is like putting a huge target in front of your enemy's eyes and asking them to hit it. A ninja must wear clothes that blend with the environment around them. Most of the environments you'll be around will be dark, and green, due to the forests around us, so your clothes must be dark colored except if you ever find yourself in Suna, where white and brown is usually the color to go with."

"But you wear a pink shirt, isn't that flashy as well?"

"Well, I'm a ranged specialist with two heavy taijutsu specialists in my team, so I don't really care about being flashy, but if the mission requires stealth, I usually wear a black variation of this outfit. But this outfit is especially made for weapon experts so it helps my skills, thus counts as viable ninja outfit."

"Oh… well I don't know anything about clothes, I just wore these because orange is my favorite color, and they're so flashy it's just great!" he said while Tenten sweat dropped.

"All right, I'll pick out some clothes for you; I'll allow you to have some orange, only because you love the color, but don't expect anything bigger than a few stripes or something like that."

Naruto watched Tenten pick clothes for him, sometimes throwing a piece away in favor for something that she liked more.

In the end, Tenten gave Naruto all the pieces she had selected and pointed to a dressing room in the back of the clothes section.

* * *

><p>Naruto came out of the dressing room, wearing the clothes Tenten picked out for him, which consisted of black ANBU pants, black steel toed combat boots, a gray loose shirt with a medium sized collar and a hood, and a long fishnet shirt underneath. The peculiar thing about the shirt was that it had one sleeve missing, exposing the fishnet. Naruto thought that it looked really cool, and stood in front of the mirror before putting the hood over his head.<p>

"Woah, now that looks both professional and cool. It fits you even better than I expected! I picked the hood so that you could hide your hair. We both know that your hair is really nice as it is, but it's still flashy, if seen in the dark of night. The purpose of the long sleeve is to hide a weapon inside, making it really good when on stealth missions. It also covers your hand from view, so it also hides anything you might be holding. I heard about your prank sprees, even painting the Hokage monument in broad daylight, so I figured that you're good at stealth issues."

"I really love it, thanks Tenten-chan!" he grinned, not noticing Tenten's blushing cheeks.

"Now, on to customization!"

"Huh?"

"We'll customize the clothes, so they fit with you perfectly, and add several things depending on your preference." She said with a smile.

"First cosmetic options. For example, are you left or right handed?"

"Ambidextrous, actually" he said proudly. He knew that it was rare to be ambidextrous and he was proud to be one.

"Now that, I consider a skill worth having. You can continue to fight even with one hand damaged. And you can throw weapons with both hands, something i can do, but with alot of practise. Anyway, which side would you prefer having the sleeve on?"

"Well, I think that having a long sleeve on the left and a free hand on the right looks mighty cool, don't you think?"

"Yes, that seems nice." She exclaimed in thought, finding the idea to have quite the style.

"Would you like any symbols on the shirt?"

"Actually yes, could we put an orange Konoha symbol on the sleeve?"

"You just can't resist the orange can you?"

"Nope" he said, grinning.

"Now, metal reinforcements" she said, making a list in her mind, and ticking of cosmetic options. "Metal reinforcements are really important. Paying a little more for reinforcements could very well save your life one day. With the style of the shirt, I would say that having some light chakra conductive metal on the back side of the collar would be very nice."

"Why chakra conductive?" he asked with an incredulous look.

"Well, the metal in itself could stop stray or weakly thrown, shuriken or kunai from grazing or piercing your neck. But being chakra conductive, it could very well stop a chuunin rank assassination jutsu, or a katana, in its tracks, saving you from unexpected assassination attempts, if there are any, and generally helping you in combat."

"Yes, that is really efficient!"

"Well, any other part you would like to reinforce with metal?"

"No, I don't think I have any."

"Well, that's it actually. Now, on to the weapons section" she said with glee, while Naruto looked at her in new light, growing quite scared of the way she talked about weapons.

* * *

><p>He could see everything ranging from simple trench knives, to katanas and axes in the weapons sector.<p>

"So, first, for a hidden weapon under that sleeve of yours, we have a certain item that will be of much use to you I believe." Said Tenten, before starting to search inside some of the many drawers in the back of the room.

Naruto was looking around, examining the different blades, until he came upon a black steeled ninjato. This particular ninjato, reminded him of a silver haired ANBU he had spied on once when he was young, who had used a ninjato that looked pretty much the same, to cut some practice dummies in half, with lightning speed, before he noticed him and told him off. He grabbed it from its stand, and proceeded to trace the blunt side of the blade with his finger, before he felt several things at once. First, a cutting force that far exceeded the sharpness of the blade, which didn't even matter as he had only touched the blunt side. Then a sting; almost like static electricity. And finally, an eerie calmness, that seemed to flow from the blade into his hand.

"Oh my god. Don't tell me you touched the blade!" yelled Tenten, a frantic look on her face.

"I only traced it to check the feel of it, did I do something wrong?" he said, a worried look on his face.

"Well, it isn't wrong, but now I'm going to have to force you to buy that. These blades are made from some of the best chakra conductive metals that exist, second to the metal that the Seven Swordsmen's Swords are made of. The metal has to be handled with care and special tools, as it reacts to the user's chakra. The metal takes the aspects of the user's chakra it 'bonds' with."

"What do you mean 'bonds'?"

"I mean that, when you touch the blade, it reacts to your chakra core and elemental affinity, making it highly conductive when used by you, and making channeling elemental chakra through it a lot easier, as well as making the chakra five times more potent. These are the choice weapons for the elite ANBU. Look at the blade; it should have the kanji of your elements."

Indeed it had. When Naruto looked at the blade, he could see the kanji for Wind, Water, and Lightning. Tenten looked at the blade in shock, before turning to Naruto, giving him an incredulous look.

"Three elements; seriously? Are you sure you are a gennin?" she said, a hint of excitement in her voice.

Just at that moment, they could see a fourth kanji being engraved on the blade, but this one was different than the rest. While the other kanji were black, this one was red, standing out from the rest of them.

"Well, I suppose we can give you that without pay today, if u promise to bring in a monthly amount to cover the cost, as I don't suppose you has enough money in hand for that. Its price actually touches ten thousand ryo, which is quite a lot for a weapon. But you will have to buy this" she said, handing him a weird mechanism, with a blade attached to it.

He inspected it, noticing that the metal of the blade was made of the same metal his metal reinforcements were made of, signaling that it was chakra conductive as well, but not to the levels of the ninjato.

"As you can probably guess it is chakra conductive. What you can't guess is that the mechanism is chakra conductive as well. Focusing chakra in the mechanism initiates a process that enlarges the blade, making it longer, and making it a perfect weapon to hide inside your sleeve. The reach of the hidden blade is twenty five centimetres long, so it's not usable from a distance, but it's perfect if you can sneak up on your opponent, or if an opponent gets too close for comfort."(AN: Think Assassins Creed hidden blade, but with chakra conductive metal)

Naruto was listening, nodding when appropriate. The prospects of this weapon actually were mind numbing. So many possibilities, it was a really efficient weapon.

"All right Tenten, I'll take that as well. Do you mind if I strap it on right now?"

"Of course not" she said, before showing him how to wear the mechanism

Naruto then grabbed the ninjato, and proceeded to go back to the room Iruka was at, to pay for the stuff that he had bought.

Tenten, looked at his back as he disappeared from view, into the other room. She couldn't stop to think about the glowing kanji on the ninjato. She had a feeling that the word would be known throughout the world one day.

The word still echoed inside her head.

'Storm'

* * *

><p>Almost double the size of my other chapters proud.  
>Most appropriate part to end this.<br>Okay, outfit was made with some Assassins creed in mind, but also some imagination of my own ^^  
>Next chapter: More training<br>Reviews appreciated.  
>~6Vor6kas6<p> 


	4. Storm

Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto.

* * *

><p>Naruto walked into the room Iruka was in, getting a feel of the hidden blade mechanism pushing his chakra into it, making the blade lash out, before retracting to its original position. It really was a quick and efficient weapon.<p>

"Naruto? Wow, I was expecting something more professional than the orange jumpsuit, but man, what you're wearing is beyond my expectations. You look more like an elite jounin, than a rookie gennin now." He said, with wide eyes.

"You really think so, Iruka-sensei?"

"Of course. Have you got enough money to pay for these?"

"Well, the ninjato is too expensive for me, so I'll pay a monthly amount until all the cost is covered. The rest of them yes, although my money supply for dire situations will be depleted." He said, his expression twisting into a semi-sad one.

"Well, Naruto looks mighty fine, don't you think?" Said a new voice, signaling that Tenten was in the room. "About the ninjato, let me get my father Naruto, so that you two can make a deal amongst yourselves."

"DAD, come over here, there's someone I want you to meet." she yelled, making Naruto and Iruka wince.

"All right, no need to yell" said a new voice. A man came from the door behind the counter, before he stood facing Iruka and Naruto. He had brown hair, like Tenten, a medium sized beard, and a scar running from the top of his right eye, to his left cheek. That, along with his ripped muscles, gave him an overwhelming look.

"Ah, Ken-san, it's been a long time." Said Iruka, a small smile plastered on his face.

"Iruka, good to see you again." He said, nodding at him. "Now, Tenten-chan, what was it again?"

"This here is Naruto, erm…well Naruto, I never got your last name, what is it?" she said, sending a questioning glance at Naruto.

"Uzumaki." He said, grinning.

"Well, nice to meet you, Naruto Uzumaki" said Ken, shaking Naruto's hand. 'Minato's kid huh. Well he's grown up nicely.'

"Anyway, dad, Naruto here, touched one of the elite ANBU ninjato, and it bonded to him. As he doesn't have enough money on him at the moment for that and the clothes he bought, I thought maybe we can set up a monthly dose, or something like that, so he can cover the cost over time."

"Don't sweat it Naruto, whenever you come up with enough money just come and repay me, the blade wouldn't be of much use since it bonded to you anyway." He grinned. "And, just because it's your first time here, I'll cut the price in half!"

"Thanks a lot Ken-san!" exclaimed Naruto with widening eyes, bowing his head lightly as a sign of thanks to Ken.

"Anyway, Naruto is that all you wanted?" said Tenten, as she got behind the counter and started to calculate the costs of the clothes. She saw Naruto nod, so she finished up the calculations. "Well this set of clothes, three duplicate sets and the hidden blade all cost six hundred ryo. Have you got enough on cash?"

Naruto nodded, taking out Gama-chan, the wallet he had gotten for his eighth birthday, by a mysterious source. Taking out the needed money, he handed them over to Tenten. Grabbing hold of the bag that contained his duplicate sets, he waved at Tenten and Ken.

"Thanks a lot for your help Tenten -chan. I hope I see you around someday. You too Ken-san! I promise I'll come up with the money soon. Let's go, Iruka-sensei." He gestured at Iruka to follow him.

* * *

><p>"So Naruto, how about we go to Ichiraku's, my treat!" said Iruka, looking at Naruto.<p>

"Hell yes!"

The two made their way to the ramen stand, pushing the curtains aside as they sat on two of the stools. Ayame greeted them with a smile and a hug to Naruto, before she got behind the counter, and started to chop some vegetables.

"Ah, Naruto-kun, Iruka-san, how are you two? It's been a while since I've seen you two, since I was on vacation" she said, taking her eyes off the vegetables, and giving them a smile.

"We're fine, Ayame-chan, I just got a new wardrobe, and I made gennin yesterday!" he said, proud about his achievements.

"That's great Naruto-kun, I'm really proud of you!"

Teuchi came, and greeted them, before taking their orders and preparing their ramen. While they were eating the ramen, or in Naruto's case, devouring it, Iruka tried to strike up a conversation.

"So, Naruto, I understand that you've been training this morning, since you ripped your pants falling off a tree." He said, snickering at the mention of Naruto's misfortune. Naruto narrowed his eyes at that. "How far have you come with the tree climbing exercise? You must be almost done by now right?"

"Well, Iruka-sensei, I made it to the top of a really tall tree, with relative ease, after training with three hundred clones. After that, I noticed that there are more possibilities for training on the tree climbing exercise. So I started training on climbing with my hands, but without the support on my legs. Then I slowly started to lessen the areas in contact with the tree, until I was climbing with my finger tips. It's the hardest thing I ever trained in, but I can already feel that my chakra control is at least triple what it was. I'm going to complete climbing with my fingertips today, and maybe complete water walking with my feet."

Naruto noticed that Iruka was looking at him with a slack jawed expression.

"What is it Iruka-sensei, did I do something wrong?"

"Climbing with your fingertips is unheard of, if not impossible. It is amazing that you even managed to climb a few inches that way. You really are amazing, Naruto!"

"I'm just that awesome, Iruka-sensei." He said, grinning.

"Just don't become an arrogant prick, Naruto, and you'll go far!"

"Fine Iruka sensei, anyway, I'm off, I have to train some more!" he said, before getting off his stool and dashing out and towards the woods he was training in before.

Iruka was left to pay for the nine bowls Naruto consumed, as well as his. He silently wept at the blow his wallet had taken.

Just before he went out, he found his path blocked by a tall man in a red kabuki outfit. He immediately recognized the man as Jiraiya of the Sannin.

"Ah, Jiraiya-sama, you're back. It's been a long time since you were sighted in the village!" he said with wide eyes.

"Yes, I'm back, but only for a little while. Seems like our little Jinchuuriki is shaping up to be real good.

"Naruto is not just a Jinchuuriki. There's more to him than meets the eye!" he said with a determined look.

Jiraiya just smiled as he walked away, towards the Hokage's office. 'Oh, I should know better than anyone, boy. I should get going; I need to inform Sarutobi about _them._'

* * *

><p>Naruto had reached the area he had trained in before. It was four in the afternoon at the moment, so he had about six hours to train before he went to bed, to wake up at sunrise the next day.<p>

Deciding to get to work, he gathered the chakra needed to summon about six hundred clones. The result, because of his constantly increasing chakra control, was around eight hundred clones. Naruto figured that once he chakra control reached a level which he couldn't surpass, it wouldn't be so hard to control the number of clones he could create.

"Okay you guys, since we're almost done with the finger climbing, I want four hundred of you to come with me, we're going to search for a river, or a lake, where we can train in water walking."

He started to walk, while taking out the scroll Iruka gave to him. It had a note of a location big enough to hold a lot of his clones, as well as it being relatively secluded. It was, luckily very close by, and within five minutes, he had reached the place.

It was a very large clearing with a large lake in the middle. The lake was big enough so that 300 of his clones could stand in the midst of it while having a comfortable space between them. He thought about what he could do with the last hundred clones. Opening his scroll, he found the first exercise for water manipulation. It consisted of putting your hands on the surface of the water and trying to create a small whirlpool under your hand. After that was done, you had to raise the level of the water under your hand, while still keeping the water spinning. These were the two steps to gain considerable control over the water element.

"All right, I want three hundred of you guys, in the midst of the lake, while the rest sit around the lake, practicing the water manipulation exercise. One of you come here, and read the two exercise from the scroll." He said, motioning for a clone to come and read the exercise. Once the clone finished reading, he told him to dispel himself so that the rest of the clones knew what to do in the exercise. At first he had only a few of the clones do the exercise. They had to watch fifty clones sink themselves in the water, for about half an hour before they started to get it. Then Naruto had them dispel themselves, so the clones knew how to float in the middle of the lake. Slowly, the clones filled the lake, all of them trying to maintain the water walking exercise. Many of them sunk, but got back on the surface by focusing chakra on their hands, kind of like when they practiced tree walking with their hands, only implementing what was needed for the water walking with feet.

Naruto watched as his clones started getting the hang of the exercise, some floating for more than five minutes before they sunk. He ordered some clones to dispel themselves, as he found that giving small boosts of chakra control to the other clones made them increase their skill exponentially. He concentrated on what the clones working with water manipulation where doing. Absolutely nothing. Not one of the clones had managed to even put a small wave in the water, let alone create a whirlpool. He joined them, hoping to be able to at least move the water by nightfall.

* * *

><p>Two hours later Naruto had made no progress on the water manipulation exercise. He and his clones were still trying to move the water, even if just a ripple. The clones working on water walking had been standing on water for the last thirty minutes. Naruto figured that they had been working on it long enough that if they dispelled he would be able to walk on water like if it was a second nature to him. So he stopped what he was doing and yelled some orders to his clones.<p>

"All right you guys, since you're already pretty much finished with the water walking, I want you to try and do what we did with the tree walking exercise. Try to stand on the water with your hands; this might even improve my balance, even if a little!" once he was finished yelling the orders he turned to look at the water in front of him.

At that moment, one of the clones dispelled, because it was low on chakra. The force from the clone dispelling was strong enough that it created a small wave. A couple of the clones that didn't notice what was going on, got carried off from the flow of the water.

Naruto watched the scene in deep thought, before he had a flash of genius.

'Flow' he thought. 'I need my chakra to flow with the water, controlling it, but not making it lose the flow. It's all about the flow.' He conveyed his idea to the other clones working on water manipulation. The clones nodded, and then concentrated on creating the whirlpool. Only this time they infused the water with their chakra, making it one with the flow, instead of trying to force down amounts of chakra and trying to make it spin. The effects were minimal for some clones while for others non-existent. Some clones had managed to cause a small ripple on the water's surface. Even that was a sign of progress. Naruto turned to his work with a determined look. He started repeating what the clones were doing.

* * *

><p>Another three hours later, it was already dark and Naruto was having trouble even summoning his chakra. He was exhausted, more than he had ever been. He slowly got up from where he had been sitting, before he ordered the clones practicing on water manipulation to dispel themselves. Since they were much less than the amount he dispelled the last few times, he only winced a little at the pain in his head, before he slowly knelt and tried the water manipulation exercise one last time. He concentrated his chakra in the water under his hand, moving the water as an extension of his body, while still letting it flow like it did normally. The water started spinning, slowly. Naruto saw this, and concentrated harder, forcing the water to go faster. The water did, indeed, go faster but slowly Naruto lost control of it.<p>

'Well, it's much better than my previous tries, and I'm happy for that.' He turned to the clones that were maintaining a hand stand on the water's surface for the last ten minutes. It seemed that maintaining a hand stand on water was actually harder than standing on it, and ten minutes was his clone's limit. He dispelled them, in groups of fifty, to lessen the effect on his head. He could already feel the results in his head, as he found that he could understand his own chakra flow better than ever.

He slowly walked back to the clearing where the clones were practicing finger walking. He saw nothing in the clearing, not even a trace of his clones, which put him in thought. At that moment a yell was heard.

"Hey Boss! We made it!" he heard one of his clones yell. He looked up and saw all of his clones on the branches near the top of the tree. He grinned, but figured that it was natural for them to get it this quick, since their chakra control had also increased from some of the clones he had dispelled when he started working on the water walking exercise. He was about to order them to dispel in groups, when all of his clones simultaneously dropped to the ground. Naruto widened his eyes, before closing them as pain was the only thing he knew. The clones knew that this would hurt him and did it on purpose to give him a headache.

'Damn bastards. I can't complain though, I made them that way.'

He sat holding his head for some time before he cleared his thoughts. He figured that there was no need to test finger walking, as all his clones had made it to the top. So he started walking back home.

When he reached his home, he didn't even bother getting out of his clothes and into pajamas. Instead, he took off his hidden blade and the hoodie, and fell on the bed, falling asleep almost instantly.

* * *

><p>Naruto was walking down the street, a frown on his face. He had had a rude awakening when his alarm clock rang while he was in the best part of his dream, receiving the Hokage hat. He was just about to put it on when the alarm clock rang and disturbed his dream.<p>

It was already midday; he had left about three hundred clones at the lake, working on water manipulation. Some were doing water walking while they were practicing water manipulation, which increased his water control as well as his chakra control at the same time.

At the moment he was heading towards the Hokage's office, he needed some help finding out how to train with his ninjato.

* * *

><p>Sarutobi had had a rough couple of days, what with all the council meetings about Mizuki's betrayal. Due to the sadistic bastard's actions, his paperwork had tripled, and he was already cursing him to the lowest pits of hell just for that.<p>

He heard his secretary yelling, and then a bump that meant that someone had hit the floor. This put him on the edge, before he sensed familiar chakra and relaxed.

He felt someone hit the door and had to duck to avoid the door hitting his face. The door went flying out of his window, and landed in the middle of the street, barely missing some of the villagers walking in the street. The two ANBU guards, Cat and Ferret, were instantly on the invader, their swords drawn, nearly piercing his neck, when Sarutobi thought it was time to intervene.

"Stand down, Neko (Cat), Inu (Dog)!" he said with a commanding voice.

They both looked at the assailant, noticing him to be Naruto, before nodding at the Hokage and saluting him. Inu disappeared, but Neko remained for some reason, looking at Naruto through her mask before she went to stand at the corner of the room. Sarutobi was incredibly surprised by her actions but he didn't say anything, wondering how that would play out. Then he noticed the Elite ANBU ninjato strapped on Naruto's side, and understood why Neko had remained. Naruto having one of those, meant that this was something more than a simple cry for attention by Naruto.

"You really need to replace that damn bitch you call a secretary, ojii-san. She wouldn't let me in, because she said I would leave stains on the floor." He said angrily.

"Well, thanks for the mention Naruto; I'll have her taken care of. First of all, what did you do to my door?"

" Well, that was truly an accident. I must've sent out a burst of chakra when I kicked it to come in."

"Fine, I'll just ignore that, but I can't have you breaking my office like that. Nice equipment by the way. Now what did you need?"

"Well, you see I bought this ninjato, and I have absolutely no idea how to train with it, and get stronger. I thought about going to the library to see if there are any scrolls with techniques, but the library always refused to serve me, so I came here to see if you've got anything that can help me."

"Well, Naruto, I have said this to you before, that I can't give you any help, since that would be considered favoritism."

He was interrupted by Neko, when she put her hand up, requesting permission to interfere.

"Have you got something you would like to say, Neko?"

"Yes sir. I see promise in this boy, and I would like to request that I guide him in the way of the sword."

Sarutobi seemed to be thinking. He actually considered this to be a great idea. He could get Naruto to open up, maybe gain a new friend out of this, while also making him stronger. The council had always favored the Uchiha, requesting that he got special training, which he sometimes got; he knew that, but he didn't have enough evidence. And it wasn't wrong to actually offer special training to a student, especially if no one found out about it. He knew he could trust Inu, the only other person in this room, to keep his mouth sealed, and maybe this would turn out great for everyone.

"All right, you have permission to teach Naruto. You also have permission to remove your mask." He said, smiling as he felt the satisfaction radiating from Neko. She really seemed to want this, and he couldn't guess why.

Neko brought her hand up to her mask, before grabbing it, and pushing chakra into it to cut the special chakra bonds that held it in place. She slowly took it off, exposing her face to Naruto. She had a beautiful face, framed by her silky purple hair, her brown eyes adding to her beauty.

"My name is Yuugao Uzuki" she said with a smile, looking towards Naruto. "Shall we get started?"

"Hell yes!" said Naruto with a grin.

"Naruto, before you go, catch!" said Sarutobi, throwing a small envelope to Naruto.

"What's this ojii-san?"

"Payment. When you intercepted Mizuki, it counted as an A rank mission, due to the importance of the scroll, and it was added to your mission count, and you have been given payment for your services to the village."

"Hai! Arigato, Hokage-ojii!" he said, before turning to Yuugao. "Ready to go!"

Yuugao motioned him to follow her. Naruto turned to look at the Hokage, winking at him, before he followed Yuugao out of the room.

'I hope this turns out good. If word gets out that I assigned someone to help Naruto, they'll be out for my head.'

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><p>Naruto followed Yuugao to a huge training ground, near the walls of Konoha, behind the Hokage monument.<p>

"Oi, Yuugao-san, what is this place?" he said, looking around trying to absorb everything around him."

"This here is a secret training ground, only jounin and up know of its existence, but there are no rules to forbid chuunin or gennin from training here. Okay, let's do a classic introduction talk, to get to know each other. I'll go first. My name is Yuugao Uzuki; I like training, swords and my precious people. I despise people who put women down, perverts, and anyone that disrespects swords in any way. My dream would be to reach the heights of Tsunade and the Sannin in renown. My skills include fire jutsu, wind jutsu, and kenjutsu. Now, follow the same pattern."

"My name is Naruto Uzumaki; I like training and the people that recognized my existence. I dislike arrogant fools, and people that judge me. My dream is to become Hokage, that way I can finally get the respect I deserve. My skills include Kage Bunshin, Henge, and Kawarimi." He said the last part with a blush, noticing how empty his skill list was.

"My, it looks like I stumbled on the perfect student"

"How the hell am I the perfect student?"

"You know absolutely nothing, except from a Kinjutsu, and two of the three basic jutsu." She smiled as Naruto pouted "That means that we can hone you in all areas, and I will be easy to start from scratch on Kenjutsu, and a taijutsu style."

"Are you going to teach me any jutsu as well?"

"Well, what are your affinities? Oh wait, don't tell me, just give me the sword and I'll see for myself."

Naruto unsheathed his sword, before giving it to her. Yuugao looked at the blade, before her eyes slowly widened to the size of saucers.

"I can't believe this. You not only have wind, lightning and water, but you also have the storm. Do you even realize what that is?"

"To be honest, I didn't know what that kanji meant. What do you mean by storm."

'I knew his time in the academy was filled with people that wanted to stunt his growth, but not learning how to read, this is ridiculous.' She thought with a frown. "Storm is an element combination I thought only existed in legends. It is said to be a combination of water, wind, and lightning, but up until now, there haven't been any recorded true storm users. " Naruto looked at her carefully, interested in what she was telling him.

"Yuugao-sensei, you said you knew wind jutsu. Can you teach me how to manipulate wind?"

"Kid, I can only teach you one thing at a time, and Kenjutsu is my priority."

"Do you know the Kage Bunshin?"

"Yes, why do you ask"

"Create a clone."

Yuugao followed what he said, creating the two clones, before wiping a bead of sweat, showing just how much of her chakra that had taken.

Naruto then proceeded to do the same hand sign, only this time, a thousand clones appeared. The result surprised him, but he knew it was only a matter of time before he reached numbers of that height. He turned to look at Yuugao, who had a shocked expression on her face, before grinning.

"Shall we get started on Kenjutsu, Yuugao-sensei? Your clone can teach my clones how to manipulate wind right?"

"Fine kid, you win, come with me."

'Oh, I'm so looking forward to see this kid in the Chuunin exams. By then I'll make him a jounin in all but rank.' She thought.

This was going to be a blast.

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><p>I would have preferred to end Naruto's training here, but I seem to favor character development, in this chapter.<br>Next Chapter: End of training, finally ^^  
>Reviews Appreciated<br>~6Vor6kas6


	5. Teams

Sorry for the delay on the chapter, I was on vacation to America and hadn't had the chance to write at all. Then real life kept me fairly busy, and I finally got time to write today. My schedule is busy from now on, so updates may come a little slower than in the summer, so excuse me for that. Enjoy.

Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto.

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><p>Naruto woke up just as the sun peaked over the Hokage monument. He had gotten used to waking up at this time, it made for a lovely morning workout, away from the villager's eyes, before he went on with his day. But today wasn't just any day. Today was the day he would get his gennin team.<p>

He disappeared in his bathroom, for a good twenty minutes, before coming out with steam filling his vision, wearing only a pair of orange boxers. He passed a mirror, on the way to his room. He turned to look at himself, noticing that some of his excess belly fat had disappeared, probably from Yuugao being a slave driver when it came to working with him. Shaking his head at the thought of his sensei, he turned and walked towards his room. He emerged a few minutes later, fully dressed, before moving towards the kitchen, to prepare some breakfast. One of the things Yuugao had pounded into him during the week was that eating only ramen would keep him short and weak forever.

Half an hour later, he picked up his ninjato, before strapping it to his back. Going to a small table near the kitchen, he picked up his hitai-ate. He strapped it on his right arm, over the exposed fishnet. He then put his different supply pouches to their appropriate places, before heading out of his apartment, closing the door behind him.

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><p>Naruto arrived at the academy earlier than even the instructors who opened the locks on the doors. Naruto made his way to a certain tree, with a swing hanging under it, before he jumped on a branch, laid on it and fell asleep.<p>

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><p>About half an hour later, his senses picked up the instructors unlocking the doors to the academy. Dropping from the branch, he put his hood over his face, and pulled his collar up, to the point that only his eyes were visible, if one were to look at him at eye level. He slowly made his way to the academy gates, before pushing them aside and entering the place.<p>

A few minutes later, he entered the classroom in which the gennin team assignments would be held. He slowly climbed up the stairs, until he made it to the furthest side of the room. He then sat next to a window, before he closed his eyes and fell asleep.

Students slowly flooded the room, one by one, and the room suddenly started filling with noise, so much that it woke Naruto up. He looked around in annoyance. With all the long training sessions he had these days, sleep was precious to him, and anyone who interrupted it, was already on his bad side.

He noticed some of them were looking at him in curiosity, trying to guess who he was. He smirked under his collar. He knew that if they knew who he was, they would just think he was showing off. No, he wasn't going to let anyone know who he was, until he was left alone with his team. He just hoped they weren't simple minded fools, or worse, fan girls. Speaking of fan girls, he could see a bunch of them fawning over the Uchiha, as always.

He felt movement to his right, and turned to see Shino Aburame sitting down next to him. He honestly didn't mind this particular person. He was one of the few respectable people in this room at the moment. And he sympathized with the boy, to an extent, due to how his clan was treated, due to their affiliation with bugs.

"It is good to see you Naruto-san" he said in a quiet, monotonous voice.

'How did he- oh wait, he's got sensor bugs.' He thought. "Hai, it's good to see you too, Shino."

At that moment, his thoughts were interrupted by screeching. Loud, horrible screeching. Ino and Sakura had been racing here, and were now fighting over who had got there first. Naruto looked at Sakura with a small smile. She really was beautiful to him, but he remembered the conversation he had with Yuugao.

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><p>'Flashback'<p>

Naruto and Yuugao were taking a break from sparring. They were sitting under the shade of a tree close to the woods that surrounded the training ground.

"So, is there anyone you like?" she said with a meaningful look.

"Well, to tell you the truth, there IS this one girl from my class, Sakura-chan, that I've had a crush on for ages"

"Oh, does she like you as well?"

"Nah, she's too busy fussing over Sasuke, to notice me."

"A fangirl?" she said, narrowing her eyes.

"Yeah, she's a fangirl but she's also really smart, the smartest in the class actually."

"Being smart doesn't count if you're dead. Fangirls end up dead usually, because they were too busy doing fangirl stuff than training. Anyway, how does this girl treat you?"

"Well, she punches me, A LOT, and says that I'm annoying."

Yuugao laughed the irony of a fangirl saying to someone that they are annoying. Naruto looked at her sadly.

"Yeah, laugh. That's what they all do…"

Yuugao looked at him, a shocked look on her face, before her expression turned to a sad one, and she got closer to Naruto.

"Hey! I wasn't laughing at you, I was laughing at the irony of a fangirl calling someone annoying. Listen, you shouldn't like a girl that thinks you're annoying and beats you up. A girl to catch your interests is one that makes you feel special, because you ARE special, but you should also feel that she's special, that there is no-one like her." She finished a small smile on her face.

Naruto looked at her, before he smiled. He then leaned back, and closed his eyes, instantly falling asleep. Yuugao shook her head at him, before following his actions.

'Flashback end'

* * *

><p>While he was reminiscing, Iruka had come in the classroom, and Naruto noticed that he was starting to get an angry look on his face. Naruto, having seen that look too many times in the past, pulled out two foam ear buds from his supply pouch, and put them in his ears, just as Iruka's head started to expand. He proceeded to watch Iruka yell senselessly to his classmates, while he couldn't hear a thing, luckily. Once he saw that Iruka had calmed down he took out the ear buds and put them back in his supply pouch. He saw Iruka looking at him oddly, which he responded to with a nod. Iruka smiled and shifted his eyes to look at the whole class.<p>

"First of all, I would like to congratulate you all on making gennin. You are now soldiers, servants to the will of the Hokage, to help protect the village from all its enemies. But gennin is just the first step. Your training is not over, and you should not think it is. We may be at a time of peace, but war could very well break out anytime. The shinobi world is a harsh world, so make sure you survive it. Now, moving on to team assignments. Team one will be…" Iruka then went on to announce the next six teams, which were picked up by their teachers, until only nine people remained in the class, excluding Iruka. "Team Seven will consist of Sakura Haruno, Uchiha Sasuke" at this Sakura screeched in joy, while Sasuke looked annoyed. Naruto's eyes were sad for a moment, before he remembered his conversation with Yuugao. She was right. "…and Naruto Uzumaki." There were several reactions to this. Sakura started protesting, while the others looked around in confusion. Shino looked at him, and Naruto could swear he saw him grin, but this was Shino we're talking about, so you can never be sure.

"But sensei! Naruto didn't graduate. We all saw him fail. So why is that annoying baka on my team?" yelled Sakura, making most of the people in the room wince at the volume.

"Naruto graduated in special circumstances, which countered the circumstances that left him unable to graduate."

"Well where is the idiot then? I don't see him anywhere. He must've chickened out or something." Said Kiba. He was about to continue when a kunai landed on the table, next to his hand, startling him. He turned to the direction the kunai came from, and he was met with cold blue eyes, shadowed by a hood. He was about to yell, when he saw the kunai get pulled back to its owner, via a thin string of chakra. Iruka saw this, and was impressed that Naruto was able to create chakra strings.

"Naruto-baka! Stop acting cool. You will never be cooler than Sasuke. You will always be a baka that will never change!" screeched Sakura.

"Haruno-san" he started, shocking her and everyone in the room, because he hadn't whined about her bringing Sasuke into the matter "First of all, you don't belong in this exchange, so it was uncalled for that you even interjected. What is more uncalled for however is that you brought Sasuke in the matter. I wasn't trying to outdo anyone, because frankly, I see no point in doing so. Lastly, you say that I can't change?" he narrowed his eyes, fixing her with a cold look. "As a ninja, you could change from a living, normal person, to a heap of burned bones with just one jutsu. Changing my attitude towards being a ninja, in one week, is not undoable, and to be honest, It's pretty much possible to do in just one day." He leaned back in his chair, observing how everyone was looking at him. One thing was common in everyone. Shock.

"Anyway, stop arguing. Now, your sensei will be Kakashi Hatake. Team Eight consists of Hinata Hyuuga, Shino Aburame, and Kiba Inuzuka. Your sensei will be Kurenai Yuuhi" said Iruka, looking at said students. Naruto directed a look to Shino, as if saying good luck. Shino got the point because he responded with a nod.

"Team nine is still in circulation from last year, so, Team Ten will consist of Ino Yamanaka, Shikamaru Nara, and Choji Akimichi. Your sensei will be Sarutobi Asuma."

'Figures they'd recreate the Ino-Shika-Cho trio. It has existed for three generations.' He smirked. 'Teamwork worthy of legends. If these three actually manage to get along and work together, I see them going very far.

"Your sensei's will meet you in a few moments, so sit back and wait for them QUIETLY."

Iruka then proceeded to exit the room to the teachers' lounge via a back door.

The remaining students started to talk amongst themselves, some of them looking at Naruto every once in a while. Naruto soaked in all the attention like a sponge, having craved for it for years. He lifted his hood, finding it a bit too dark for his liking, revealing his face for the first time that day. While the other students turned to look at him, he heard the door open, and the sounds of someone coming in.

He turned to look at the door, and saw two people coming in. One of them was wearing the standard jounin outfit, and was smoking a cigarette. His hair was black and spiky. The other one was a raven haired woman in her mid twenties. She wore a peculiar white battle dress with a red sleeve on one side, and bandages covering her other three appendages. The most striking thing about her appearance was her red eyes, however. They looked a lot like the sharingan, but when Naruto looked at it closely, he noticed that there were no tomoe on the inside circle of the eyes.

The raven haired kunoichi stepped up, opened her mouth and said "Team Eight with me!". Immediately, Kiba, Hinata and Shino followed her outside the room. Naruto then saw the other jounin step up and call for Team Ten, who also followed their sensei outside the room.

Now it was just him, Sasuke, and Sakura. When he noticed that, he started to observe his new teammates. Sasuke was brooding, as usual. Naruto could guess what he was brooding about, and to some point he sympathized with him, but he could shake off the fact that some of the brooding and serious attitude was just for show, a mask. Sakura on the other hand, was as careless as ever; too busy fawning over Sasuke to notice her surroundings. It was time she started to notice what happened around her, and Naruto was going to see to that. He started to snicker quietly as he thought of something, and saw Sasuke looking at him oddly, to which he only winked.

Sakura was as usual fawning over Sasuke, asking him about what their babies would look like, not noticing that she was thinking aloud, and Sasuke was looking at her with a really frightened look, at this point. She was about to 'think' about what their marriage would be like, when she felt a tug on her leg, and in a seconds time, she was on the ground, holding her head in pain.

"That should teach you, to always be aware of your surroundings. You never know when the enemy is going to strike." She heard Naruto say, to which she was about to retaliate, before she saw a hand clad in fishnet, offering to pick her up. She accepted the hand reluctantly, before she raised her head to look at Naruto, eye to eye.

"You baka, why the hell did you do that?" She was just seconds of punching him.

"I saw you weren't paying attention to your surroundings, and decided it was time to give you a lesson in the REAL ninja world, not the heroic grand battles you read about in your favorite books. The real wars are the undercover ones. Assassinations, ANBU missions, without these, the world would be infested with greedy bastards, and so many tyrants. Subtlety is what should describe us ninja, but sadly it doesn't. I won't go hypocrite on you guys, I like flashy techniques and all, but stealth is so much more practical." He said, finishing with a carefree look, before he went back to his table, sat down, and promptly fell asleep.

Sakura looked at him in shock, a look she kept on him for quite some time, before shifting her gaze to her table, deep in thought.

Sasuke was looking at Naruto in a whole new light. At first he had thought the new gear, and the supposed new attitude was just for show, but he had observed the kunai he had thrown to Kiba. He had thrown the kunai with such speed, while putting a minimal amount of power in his throws. It seemed like his growth was over at that, but then he saw Naruto pulling the kunai back with some sort of blue line, which he guessed was made out of chakra. Something so long and thin, would require a delicately picked amount of chakra to be used, so he guessed Naruto's chakra control had also increased immensely in this one week he had gone without seeing the blond fool. And now he had just confirmed the attitude he was showing before, not that of a small and ignorant child, but that of an experienced and deadly , to an extent, ninja. Now he didn't think that Naruto was above him in skill, there was no way he could beat an Uchiha, especially after Sasuke would manage to unlock his potential with the sharingan, but Sasuke had found a small sliver of respect in his feelings for the dobe, something he hadn't felt for anyone, since the time he and his brother were friends.

Shifting his thoughts to the matter in hand, their sensei was already an hour late, something which said a lot about his character and attitude towards things. He was thankful for the one time silence he was now enjoying, so he drifted his thoughts to more important subjects, like how he was going to destroy his brother's corpse after he had killed him.

* * *

><p>Kakashi Hatake was inside the academy, walking towards the class where he was supposed to find his new students. To be honest, he had no intention of passing them, but, this team intrigued him to no end. First, there was Sasuke Uchiha, a supposed pretty boy, with the skills to match. He was also really interested in this one, due to his connection to Obito. Second was Sakura Haruno, a fangirl that was supposedly really smart for her age, but Kakashi knew better than that. He would just have to wait and see for that one. Last but not least, was Naruto Uzumaki. Now Kakashi was no fool, he had made the connection to Kushina, and Minato, long before Sarutobi had told him. He knew, just from his parents, that Naruto was destined to be someone, but data showed that he was the dead last in his class. He also took to wearing a full orange jumpsuit, something very stupid in the ninja world. He still managed to stealth through the village for his various pranks, even in that flashy jumpsuit. He guessed there was hidden potential in Naruto, waiting to be unlocked.<p>

He reached the door of class 403, the class where he was supposed to meet his team. He slid the door, popping his head inside, to check if he had the correct classroom. He was met with an image, far from what he had expected. Sasuke was doing what he thought he would be doing, brooding, as usual. The weird thing was that there was no Sakura around him, to annoy him, and he actually seemed content with the silence. Thinking about Sakura, he turned to look at the pink haired form, who also seemed to be in deep thought. Even through that, he could still see her green eyes stealing glances on the Uchiha, every once in a while. The third figure in the room surprised him. He could see that it was Naruto, but he wasn't clad in orange. Instead, he was wearing some really professional looking gear. He also had an elite ANBU style ninjato strapped on his back. Kakashi briefly wondered where he had got the money for it, before dismissing his thoughts and coughed.

The three newly instated gennin looked to the source of the coughing, to see a semi-masked head, with gray, gravity defying hair, popping out of a small opening in the door. All of them sweat dropped at the sight, before hearing the weird jounin speak.

"My first impression of you all, you seem quite alright. Meet me up at the roof in '5" He said, before disappearing in white smoke.

The three gennin looked at each other oddly, before moving towards the door. They quietly climbed up the stairs to the roof, which was three floors away. Naruto noted that Sakura seemed a little winded, only by those three flights of stairs. He shook his head in disappointment, before looking around to find their teacher. He found him leaning on the railing, towards the end of the balcony, waiting for them. Once they got closer, he motioned for them to sit on the steps in front of him. They all sat down and looked at him.

"Why were you so late?" said Naruto, just remembering that their teacher had been about three hours late.

"Oh that, well, you know, I was coming here, and I saw a black cat, so I had to take the long way around."

Naruto fixed him with a blank look, that started to make Kakashi nervous after a while. Just as Kakashi started to sweat, Naruto started laughing. He was laughing hysterically, to the point where he fell over holding his belly.

"What's so funny?" said Kakashi, who was taken aback by Naruto's laughing.

"That's the funniest excuse I've heard in ages! Man, I sure am going to use that in the future" he said, after he had settled down. He was still snickering, until Kakashi fixed him with a look that said stop.

"Now, we haven't been properly introduced yet. So let me introduce myself. My name is Kakashi Hatake. Now, tell me a little more about yourselves, I only know your names and grades through my data books, I want to hear about you from your own lips" he eye-smiled.

"What should we say, Kakashi-sensei?" exclaimed Sakura, a little loudness in her voice.

"Oh you know, likes, dislikes, hobbies, dreams, that kind of stuff. You first, Sakura was it?"

"Hai. My name is Sakura Haruno, as you probably know. I like…" at this point she looked at Sasuke and started giggling. "My dislikes are Ino, and people that smell real bad. My hobbies are flower arranging and reading books. My dreams for the future are..." again, she looked at Sasuke, before she started to giggle even more than before. At this point, the male's sweatdrops were getting quite heavy.

"Okay…How about you, Sasuke, right?"

"Right. My name is Sasuke Uchiha" he said emphasizing the Uchiha part, showing his arrogance. "I don't particularly like anything and I dislike almost everything. My hobbies are thinking, and training. What I have is not a dream, it's not even an ambition. It's something I plan to make a reality. I will kill a certain man, and I will restore the Uchiha clan to its former glory, and even more." He finished his words with a glare he thought made him look overwhelming. Naruto was looking at him with an incredulous look, wondering just how high in the clouds was this kid swimming.

"So much gloom! Lighten up kid! Life's too short to be sad." He said, watching as Sasuke glared at him. If only they knew how gloomy he was himself, they would know just what a hypocrite he was being at the moment. "Anyway, last but not least, blondie, you're Naruto, correct?"

Naruto sweat dropped at the blond comment, but none the less, he nodded. "Hai. You all know me, so I'll skip the name. I like ninjutsu, kenjutsu, ramen, Iruka-sensei and Yuugao-chan. I dislike arrogant people, fangirls, people that put others down, and people that judge others without getting to know them first. My hobbies are training, gardening, pranking, and a newly found hobby of mine, is realizing just HOW stupid some people really are." He finished with a grin. "My dream for the future, is to be Hokage, to protect the people of this village, so they can see , just how wrong they were about me." He said, striking a determined pose. He didn't notice Sakura looking at him in slight awe, and Sasuke looking at him intently. He did notice that Kakashi was eye-smiling, and he grinned in reaction.

"Way to be talkative blondie! Anyway, you all seem like a very interesting bunch. I think we'd do quite well as a team, but FIRST!" he said, striking a very dramatic looking pose…in his eyes. To the others eyes, he just looked stupid. "There is another, harder test that you must pass, before being officially instated as gennin."

"But sensei, we already passed our test" screeched Sakura, making the others wince at the volume. Kakashi started laughing, first quietly, and then it turned to outright psychotic laughing.

"That little test, was to weed out the complete dumbasses. This next test, is to designate just who is worthy of being a ninja for our village. Out of the twenty seven graduates that passed, only sixty six percent of the gennin will pass. That means that only three teams will become officially instated gennin teams."

Naruto, Sasuke, and Sakura widened their eyes at that, before their faces steeled into determination. They would have to pass this test, no matter what.

"Meet me in training ground number seven, tomorrow morning, for your gennin test. Oh and make sure you don't eat, lest you throw up. Bye!" he finished, before disappearing.

They all sat there, contemplating what they had just heard. Naruto made the first move, getting up, and slowly walking to the railing. He stepped on the railing, and stayed there, balancing.

"You guys up for some ramen later tonight? Both of you! I figured that since we're a team we should get to know each other. You should at least know who is going to save your ass one day." He grinned.

"I wouldn't need saving from the likes of you" exclaimed Sasuke. He was about to say no, when he thought about it more clearly. This Naruto intrigued him, and he wanted to know about what brought he change in him. "But, it's been a while since I've had ramen, so I'll join you. And don't go thinking anything, this is a onetime thing." He finished, looking away childishly.

"If Sasuke-kun is coming, then so am I" said Sakura, excited to finally be almost alone with the boy of her dreams. Even if Naruto would be there, he didn't seem that much interested in her anymore, so he wouldn't annoy her. And to be honest with herself, she wanted to know more about this new Naruto, as well as Sasuke.

"Great, so I'll see you guys at Ichiraku's, around eight o'clock tonight?" he asked, to which the others nodded. He nodded as well, before jumping off the railing. Sakura screamed, and run to the edge of the balcony, trying to see if Naruto was ok. She saw him running on the wall, before he came to a stop near the ground and jumped off. He then proceeded to walk amongst the crowd, until he was out of sight. 'Just what happened to Naruto, in this past week?' she wondered. She was about to ask Sasuke, but when she turned around to look at him, he wasn't anywhere in sight. Sakura sighed, before she started walking towards the stairs, lost in thought. She was really excited about this team for some reason, and she couldn't place her finger on it, but Naruto's behavior towards her had stirred something within her.

He intrigued her

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><p>Again, sorry for the late update, life's been a bitch. I promise I will write more from now on.<br>Reviews greatly appreciated.

~6Vor6kas6


	6. Bonding

I'm sorry for the super long delay, at first I had a minor writers block, and then my keyboard failed on me, and then real life kicked in, and whenever I had the time to write, I just didn't feel like it, and I'd hate to write a half-assed chapter just for the sake of it. Anything I say just sounds like an excuse, and I will just state the truth, I wasn't in the mood to write. Now it's summer and I've got plenty of time, and I'll try to keep this on a tightly updated schedule. Thank you for your patience for all these months, and if you're one of the people that read this story 7-8 months back when I last updated, I thank you for coming back here to continue reading my story.

I hope you enjoy this chapter, I put a lot of work into it, as some scenes were giving me a lot of trouble, and I didn't know how to express myself. For the people that pm-ed me about the story being too cheerful, I have one response to that issue: I'll make sure Naruto matures quickly, as I don't really like him all that cheerful either. But looking at the facts, at that age Naruto was a livid boy that was cheerful for no reason, and that's what made us love/hate him in the story. The change must be gradual, as his mental, and physical level progress, and he gets some insight on the ninja world, and how cruel it is.

Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto.

* * *

><p>Naruto was walking through the streets of Konoha, ignoring all the cold looks. He had gotten used to the looks, It was his drive to be better, so he could shift those cold looks, to looks of respect.<p>

His thoughts shifted to his new team. Sakura seemed to be shaken by what he said to her, and she did have potential as a kunoichi. Whenever she was angry with him, she would throw the most devastating punches he knew of. If she could learn to harness that anger, without actually going into an angry state and loosing focus, she would make a formidable taijutsu user. Other than that she only had history knowledge and moderate to good knowledge of the Academy Jutsus, and that was about it.

Sasuke on the other hand, he knew almost nothing about his skills. He knew that he could throw his kunai at his targets, he knew he could perform the basic academy jutsus, and he knew he was good at taijutsu, but that was about all he knew about his cold team was no way that Sasuke only had those in his arsenal. He absolutely didn't know what to make of him. He seemed like he could make the best of friends, or the greatest of enemies, depending on who he was facing.

Kakashi, he knew some things about. Yuugao had made one of his clones read the bingo book a few days ago, stating that being informed about dangerous opponents could mean the difference between life and death. His clone hadn't been paying much attention, but he knew that Kakashi was widely known as the copy ninja, and was ranked as an A rank ninja in the bingo book. That meant that he was one of the most powerful people in the village at the moment. He was on his way to Yuugao's place to see if she had any info on Kakashi, and this supposed second test.

* * *

><p>Yuugao lived in the shinobi side of the village, so she had less noise to worry about whenever she needed to rest. People in the shinobi side of the village usually kept quiet. There were exceptions of course. The neighborhood that hosted Gai, Anko, and Kakashi, was fairly noisy, to put it ever so lightly. Yuugao usually had little time to relax, and it was precious to her.<p>

Naruto knew where she lived, as she had brought him with her on one night when he was dead tired, and he didn't have the strength to walk back home. He of course was as energetic as ever the next day, but that was beside the point.

He found Yuugao gazing over the village, a favorite past time of hers in the afternoons, while sitting on her balcony's railing. She smiled and waved when she saw him. He got closer, jumped to the balcony above him, and sat next to her, turning his gaze towards the village.

"So, I'm quite sure you're not here just for a friendly visit. What's up?" She asked him, turning her gaze towards him.

"You guessed it, I need some information on a few things."

"Oh, little Naru's out on an information hunt. Feeling sneaky, are we?" she said with a sly smile.

"I told you not to call me Naru. Anyway, yes I am feeling sneaky. What can you tell me about Kakashi Hatake, and this so called second gennin test?"

"Hm. Kakashi Hatake is probably one of the strongest people in this village, as of this moment. The only stronger being the Hokage, and the Sannin, which are out of the village for various reasons. He was the student of the Yondaime Hokage, Minato Namikaze. He is known to be an open pervert, reading porn in public" she scowled at that, making Naruto edge away in fear, because he knew how much she hated perverts. "He is known as the Copy Ninja in all the Elemental Nations, the reason being that he copied over a thousand techniques with a Sharingan he acquired under unknown circumstances, since he isn't an Uchiha. He also is famous for not passing a single team of newly graduated gennin" she grimaced at that.

"What do you mean not passing a single team? Do you mean to tell me that out of god knows how many teams have passed through his hands, not even one team has made it to full gennin team?" he said with a look showed genuine surprise.

"Yep. Most people say that he didn't pass them because he was bored of taking on a team but I know better than that. Kakashi isn't that shallow, all the teams he got just didn't meet his expectations.

"Hm. We'll see. What about the second gennin test."

"Oh that's simple. The first gennin test was to evaluate where you stood in the academy related techniques, and your general knowledge, while this second gennin test is to test out how you work as a team, and also to evaluate your skills as a whole. Each Jounin has their own test that they give to the gennin recruits, so I can't really tell you much about Kakashi's test. All I can tell you is that Kakashi hates people who abandon their teammates more than anything."

"And how do you know that?"

"He was my ANBU captain for a while, before he retired back to Jounin, and I became one of the Hokage's personal guards."

"So my sensei is not only one of the strongest in the village, but he was also an ANBU captain once? Seems like I got lucky, and I'll finally learn something from someone other than you or Iruka." He was about to continue when he saw Yuugao looking at him with her eyes fixed in a death stare. "Not that you don't teach me enough, but versatility is really profitable when it comes to senseis. You can implement techniques from different senseis in your style, making it so much more unpredictable. And being unpredictable in the ninja world is practically what it means to be a ninja." He finished hurriedly while scratching the back of his head.

"I guess you're right."

"Anyway, I have to go, Yuugao-sensei! I arranged dinner with new teammates to get to know them some, and its already close to sunset!" he said, standing on the railing, pausing to admire the sun setting on the edge of the forest, which was directly to their right.

"Hey, wait! You didn't tell me who your teammates are!"

"Oh yeah, it must've slipped my mind. Well I got Sasuke Uchiha and Sakura Haruno as teammates."

"So you got that banshee fangirl that you have a crush on.."

"First of all, don't be so mean. She's just a fangirl, not a banshee" he said with a sheepish look, "and second, I think I'm over her now. I still feel a slight tingle whenever I see her, but I just push it down."

"Hm, okay that's good. Anyway so you got her, and that brooding Uchiha that thinks he's king of the world?"

"Exactly"

"You really do have your work cut out for you, don't you kid."

"Well, most of the time, I do" he said, before waving to her, and jumping off the railing, to the nearest rooftop.

Yuugao watched him traverse the rooftops with a smile, 'This kid is really something, isn't he...I picked him up a week ago, where he had nothing but kage bunshin, and some chakra and elemental exercises down, and since then he's come to a point where..'

Her train of thought was interrupted by her ninja senses kicking in, making her kick off the railing and jump to the nearest rooftop, before turning to look up her balcony, her sword already in her hands. She sheathed the sword after seeing a familiar upwards mop of white hair, signaling the arrival of Kakashi Hatake. She then proceeded to jump back up the balcony, with a sheepish look on her face. She saw his eye smile, which meant that he was smiling underneath his mask.

"I see you haven't lost your touch at detecting me. You're one of the few people I know that can detect me before I even get close to them." He said, looking at her with a smile.

"Well, you can say I had a good mentor." She grinned.

"The Hokage informed me of Naruto's status as your apprentice a few hours ago, as I will be the kid's guardian, if he manages to pass my second gennin test that is. I won't ask you about the kids skills, as I want to see them for myself, but I wanted to know whether you've seen any instability regarding his companion"

"Actually, there's been no sign of it at all, except from the constant supply of chakra. I would have thought that in one whole week of tough training, its chakra would have surfaced whenever Naruto's chakra was low, but it seems the kid, and the seal, have been doing an amazing job keeping it at bay. "She said, giving him a thoughtful look.

"Well that's good to hear. So I can be sure that there won't be any unexpected events during the training I have planned out for them, if they pass the gennin test."

"Just what exactly is this infamous gennin test of yours that has crushed the dreams of gennin hopefuls for so long?"

"Oh, you'll have to wait for Naruto to tell you tomorrow after we get finished" he said in a cheerful tone. "Wouldn't want you spoiling the surprise now, would we?"

She shot him a look that made him scratch his head nervously.

"Well, it was nice seeing you Yuugao, I've got to go now, see ya!" and with that he shunshined away.

'Kakashi hasn't changed one bit, has he?' she smiled before turning to walk in her apartment. 'I hope Naruto passes this test of his. Kakashi can be one hell of a teacher, if he focuses on his students instead of lazing around'.

* * *

><p>At the moment, the blonde sunshine was in his room, lying on his bed, letting his muscles relax. He had half an hour before he had to meet his teammates at Ichiraku's so he wasn't in any kind of rush. His thoughts shifted to Yuugao. He had bonded with her quite quickly. He guessed it was because she was friendly with him, and taught him stuff, and she had even volunteered to do it, there wasn't anyone forcing her to do it. She seemed like a genuinely nice person, but her skills didn't reflect on her personality. She fought with a fierceness that seemed well hidden within her, and she kept flowing from jutsu, to taijutsu, to kenjutsu, with such agility, that it was made clear why she had a place in the ANBU, and was the Hokage's personal guard. He could only get a few-if any- hits in, whenever he fought her, and that was when he was lucky enough not to be dodging a wide range of projectiles and ninjutsu. Speaking of jutsu, the woman's skills in fire and wind jutsu were practically phenomenal, to his inexperienced eyes. He had only seen a few jutsu users and she probably was at the top of them all. She had taught him a lot about the philosophy of wind jutsu, and he had come out of the first week of training armed with a few jutsu that he had been craving to use in a real battle. His spars with Yuugao didn't count as real battles because Yuugao could kill him before he could blink if she really wanted to.<p>

Looking outside his window, he guessed that it was about time he headed off to meet his team. He looked at himself in the mirror. His eyes focused on his shirt. He gave it some thought before taking his shirt off, leaving him with the long-sleeved fishnet shirt underneath. It gave him a more casual look, and that was what he was aiming for whenever he was in town. He grinned at himself in the mirror, before heading towards the door. As he was about to open the door, he looked at the two pictures on the table next to him. One was of him and Iruka, the same Iruka had at his place, and the other was a more recent one. It was of him and Yuugao, three days back, when they had gone at Ichiraku's to eat after training for the whole day. Yuugao had asked Teuchi to take a photo of them. This gesture of hers not only surprised Naruto, but it made him happy as well. It showed him that Yuugao wasn't only training him because it was her mission, but because she truly cared about him, and also, it seemed that Yuugao was gradually becoming one of his few friends in the village. That's why when he looked at himself in the picture, the only thing he saw was pure happiness. He wondered if the same feelings would develop for this team of his, or if they would just be the same bashing idiots they were back in their class. He guessed that it was time he found out. He turned the door knob and exited his apartment.

* * *

><p>As he got closer to Ichirakus he recognized his teammates already sitting on the stools. He pushed the curtains aside and stayed there, because he saw a scene that actually surprised him. He had expected to see Sakura fawning over Sasuke as usual, blabbing about the stuff fan girls blab about. But instead Sakura was sitting next to Sasuke and was actually talking with him on normal levels, and Sasuke seemed to actually be responding with short answers, instead of flat out ignoring her. This intrigued Naruto to no end; had he actually initiated such a change in the pink haired girl's attitude?<p>

He shook his head to clear his thoughts and proceeded to sit next to Sasuke. He turned to his teammates and waved.

"Hey guys!" He said with a smile. He then turned towards the kitchen. "Hey Ayame-chan! Teuchi-san!"

"Oh ho, it looks like my favorite customer is back in the house!"

Teuchi came from around the back, holding a towel and wiping his hands. "What can I do for you guys" he said while looking at them with a smile.

"Well I'd like my usual starter course, what about you guys?" at which he turned to look at his teammates.

Sasuke looked at the menu for a second before opening his mouth. "Beef ramen" Teuchi and Naruto sweat dropped before shaking their heads simultaneously.

"I'll have the veggie ramen please" Sakura said, before putting down the menu and looking at Teuchi.

"What are you, on a diet or something?" said Naruto with an incredulous look.

"Well, actually, I am! A lady needs to maintain her form, doesn't she?" she exclaimed while crossing her arms, like she was scolding Naruto.

"Sakura, you may be a lady, but you're also a kunoichi, and kunoichi don't diet. Dieting leads to you not having energy, and that may lead to your own death. I'm not going to argue with your choice on dieting tonight, but I suggest that from now on you try to eat healthily, least you die on us someday." He finished with a cheerful smile, not noticing Sakura's horrified expression.

"Fine, make that a chicken ramen for me" she said reluctantly, after giving it some thought. Naruto just looked at her while nodding approvingly, to which she responded with a small smile.

"All right, one Naruto starter course, one beef ramen and one chicken ramen, coming right up!" and with that Teuchi headed back into the kitchen.

Sasuke listened to Naruto and Sakura's exchange while he kept his brooding pose. Naruto's words were a hundred percent true. He didn't know just what had initiated this change in the drop out kid he knew, but he found his respect for his new teammate growing steadily. If there was as big a change in his fighting skills as there was in his attitude about being a ninja, then this team wouldn't be half bad after all. And it seemed that Naruto had initiated a change in his pink haired team mate as well. Her attitude towards him and towards everything was a lot different than it was yesterday, and he noticed that the change had started after Naruto had spoken to her so coldly in front of everyone, and afterwards, when he pulled her to the ground with that weird chakra string of his.

"..ening to me?" he suddenly heard "Hey! Sasuke!" he heard Naruto yell again. 'I must've spaced out or something'. He shot Naruto a look that signaled that he was listening to him.

"I asked you something, but apparently you didn't hear me. Sakura and I were talking about this new sensei of ours, Kakashi. He seemed quite nice, but I went to a friend of mine who knew Kakashi a few years back. She told me that he is supposedly one of the strongest people in this village at this moment, since the Sannin are out of the village." This sparked Sasuke's interest. "But, it's quite known around the village, that he hasn't passed a single gennin team, in all his years of being a jounin." Naruto saw Sasuke's eyes widen a little, before his face was fixed in a confident smirk.

"Well, we'll break his team-free streak then, won't we?" he was actually feeling confident on the whole team's chances, not only his.

"Hell yes we will!" Naruto responded with a smile, while extending his fist towards Sasuke and Sakura. They just starred at it for a little, confused. "Bump it." He stated. They slowly raised their fists and bumped them with Naruto's own, at which Naruto grinned. "Team fist bump!"

Sasuke shook his head at the blonde's antics but he then realized that he himself was smirking. Sakura just laughed at both their antics.

"The ramen is here!" they heard a female voice say. They turned and saw Ayame laying down steaming bowls of ramen in front of everyone. Sasuke and Sakura had one bowl each, while Naruto had 4 bowls in front of him.

"Hey Ayame-chan!" said Naruto, a big smile plastered on his face as his eyes shifted to the bowls in front of him. It had been a few days since he had had ramen, and that was the longest he had ever gone without it. He picked a pair of chopsticks from the bowl in front of him, and looked at the others.

"Itadakimasu!" he said finally, after all of them were ready to eat. Sasuke and Sakura were eating slowly, like a normal person would. Naruto on the other hand was practically breathing the ramen in. Before any of them could finish a third of their bowl, Naruto was moving on to his second bowl. They both were looking at him slack jawed, before turning to Ayame with questioning eyes.

"Yes, he always eats like that, and that's only the start course. There's more in the back being prepared for him." She said, recognizing their face. Just about everyone that Naruto brought with him here had that face the first time. Yuugao's facial expression was still fresh in her head. She and her father had had a good laugh after seeing her shocked face.

"How many bowls does he normally eat?" Sakura said, while looking at Naruto wearily.

"Well, he normally eats around 10-12 bowls, but his record is 23 bowls of ramen. Don't ask me how, I have no idea." She said, enjoying their even more surprised looks.

"I guess I should have expected that." Sakura said, while shaking her head.

"You guys do know that I can hear you talking about me, don't you? I mean you're sitting next to me!" said Naruto, now finished with his four bowls, while crossing his arms and pouting at them. Ayame laughed at the blonde's antics, while Sakura looked at the exchange with intrigue. Was this how Naruto interacted with people precious to him? He seemed to have changed over the course of one week, and in class he seemed even colder than Sasuke at times. But it seemed that he had just suppressed his happy emotions, and kept them out of his ninja life. She frowned a little at that attitude, but she knew that that is what ninjas were supposed to do. Now that they were in town, and eating like normal civilians, Naruto seemed to have let himself laugh and smile again, like he had for years before, but something was different even about his laughs. She just couldn't put her finger on it, but Naruto had changed for the better.

* * *

><p>A couple of hours had passed since the trio had sat down at Ichiraku's to eat. During that time they had gotten to know each other better than they ever had. What they learned were minor details like favorite colors and such, but it was a start. Naruto was happy to see that even Sasuke was cooperating, even if his answers were brief and somewhat cold. Sakura seemed to have gone out of her banshee state in one short day, maybe due to the shock that Naruto's words caused her. He guessed that it was only a matter of time before she actually became serious about becoming a ninja, but at least she was on the right path. He checked the clock on the wall behind Teuchi, and saw that it was time to go. He took out Gama-chan, his wallet and turned to the others.<p>

"Well guys, it's about time we went our ways, we wouldn't want to be late for Kakashi-sensei's big test tomorrow, would we?" he said. "Dinner tonight is on me." He continued with a smile. Sakura was about to protest but Naruto gave her a look that made her shut up and accept what Naruto was doing. Naruto handed the necessary payment to Teuchi, who took it with a greedy smile.

"Now, in all seriousness, something ticked me off about this test of his. The point where he said not to eat anything isn't very logical at all. We need to eat or else we won't have the energy to fight, or do whatever activity he needs us to do. Maybe this is to actually check if we know that small detail. I suggest you eat something, even if it isn't a complete breakfast, so you can last the day."

"But Naruto, Kakashi-sensei clearly said that we can't eat for tomorrow!" exclaimed Sakura, kind of frustrated that Naruto would disobey their sensei's orders.

"Actually if you remember, he _suggested_ that we don't eat. He never really ordered us not to." He said, winking at her.

Sasuke listened to the exchange with interest. What Naruto said had been completely true. He himself would probably eat something next morning. He checked the time. It was about time he left for his night training session. He stood up and looked briefly at his teammates before turning his back on them.

"Anyway I'm off. See you tomorrow. Good night." He said while waving his hand.

"See ya!" Naruto said with a grin.

"Bye Sasuke-kun" Sakura said with a smile.

"Hn" he said with a smirk.

Once they saw Sasuke disappear in the late night crowd, Sakura turned to Naruto.

"Anyway Naruto, I'm off as well. And… Thank you for telling me those things today. They were a real eye opener. I think I became a kunoichi for the wrong reasons. I guess I'll have to search for a reason to be a ninja after we pass the second test tomorrow" she said with a gentle smile.

"No problem Sakura. That's what team mates do, isn't it?" he said. He wasn't really expecting an answer, as he waved behind his back while he headed off towards his place.

Sakura looked at his back. She wondered just what made Naruto change his attitude so much about being a ninja. Maybe she needed a dose of that. She had become a kunoichi so she could get closer to Sasuke and impress him with her skills. But it seemed that the only true skill she had was her big brain and her chakra control. And deep down she knew that the only reason she had good chakra control was because of her extremely small chakra pool.

With these thoughts in her head Sakura disappeared into the night crowd as well heading off towards her home.

* * *

><p>The day Naruto woke up early, even earlier than the sunrise. It was around 5'o clock when he came out of his apartment, fully equipped and ready for anything. He started going for the training ground Kakashi had told them to meet at, training ground 7. He still had two hours maximum until his team mates arrived there so he was probably going to train on his wind manipulation or his kenjutsu while his team mates got here. He didn't want them seeing just what he was capable off just yet, he'd prefer to keep his full skills a secret for as long as possible.<p>

Once he arrived at the training ground, he took his hoodie, and the hidden blade off, and set them on the ground next to a tree in the middle of the training ground, about 50 meters away from some wooden posts. He guessed that was where he was supposed to meet his team. He went and inspected the wooden posts. They were filled with marks of strong kicks and punches and even slash marks. This signified that they were sturdy enough for what he was going to train in. He took a basic fighting stance Yuugao had taught him, his open palms in front of him, and his legs open, right leg behind the left one. He closed his eyes in concentration, before he started kicking the wooden post, with speedy but controlled kicks. He smirked while he continued to kick the post, switching legs every few kicks.

* * *

><p>Sasuke Uchiha was in training ground 7 way earlier than what he would be normally. It was 6'o clock in the morning. He woke up because of his daily nightmare, and decided to train to vent off his frustration. He normally trained in one of the many small woods Konoha had inside the village walls, which was very near his home but this time he decided to go to the training ground he was supposed to meet his team in.<p>

He wasn't expecting anyone to be there this early but instead he saw Naruto in the distance training on one of the wooden post. As he got closer, he noticed a tree out of Naruto's sight and laid his back on it while watching the blonde. His curiosity peaked when he noticed that the usual thumps you would normally hear from flesh hitting wood wasn't there, the only thing he heard was the whooshing of the air around Naruto's foot. The sound of the air was abnormally loud, so he guessed that there was a lot of power behind those kicks, but none of them were connecting with the wood. He couldn't guess what kind of training his team mate was doing at the moment so he just decided to ask.

As he got closer he saw that Naruto hadn't heard him yet, so he took the opportunity to look at what his team mate was doing from a closer point of view. He saw slashes on the post which he guessed was from Naruto practicing with his sword or something similar, but nothing that indicated what Naruto was doing. He moved a few steps closer, and was ready to speak to the blonde, but at that moment, Naruto disappeared from his view and the next second he felt the cold metal of Naruto's ninjato on his neck.

"Oh Sasuke, it's you. I'm sorry for this, it was just reflex." He heard Naruto say, before he felt the blade leave his neck, and felt Naruto give him a pat on the shoulders. Sasuke turned to look at Naruto with shock evident on his face. It seemed that the blonde had increased his speed by at least double what he had before. His detection probably needed some work since he was around 3 meters away from him when the blonde detected him, but it still was miles from what he was before.

'A large burst of speed won't make much difference in a fight though. I'm an Uchiha for pity's sake; I am above this kid in skill. And when I unlock my sharingan, he will never be able to catch up.'

"Hn." He said while looking the other way. "What was it you were doing? You weren't touching the post at all. Are you really that bad at targeting that you always miss it, dobe?" he said scoffing at the blonde. He didn't really mean what he said. He wasn't a naïve little kid, he knew that Naruto's 'training' had a higher purpose than hitting the post.

"Oh, that's a surprise I'm keeping hidden for as long as I can." Naruto said with a smirk, not at all phased by Sasuke's insults. "You'll just have to wait and see."

"Hn. Whatever idiot, I'm not going to pretend to be interested in your 'training' anyway." Sasuke said, a cold look on his face.

They both proceeded to glare at each other a little. This was the scene Sakura arrived to.

"You guys just never change, do you?" she said with a smile, drawing both of their attention on her. She shook her head and went to the nearest tree, and promptly sat down, with her back on the tree bark. The other two followed her actions, deeming that a little rest might be necessary for the test that awaited them. They still kept their distance from each other, glaring at each other every few seconds. Naruto picked up his gear and put it back on, ignoring the strange looks his team mates directed towards his hidden blade while he was putting it on.

"Have you guys eaten anything?" he asked them, happy to receive nods from both of them. It pleased him that his team mates actually took the time to respect what he said to them, instead of just waving away the 'drop-out's' advice.

He sat down next to Sakura and started meditating. Meditating still came as a hard thing to him, as he was known for never being able to stay still for far too long. But Yuugao said that meditating was necessary if he wanted to be able to master his elements, so he followed his sensei's words to the letter. He was soon absorbed by his thoughts, and promptly shut off the outside world.

* * *

><p>A few hours later, Kakashi arrived at a very peculiar scene. Sasuke and Sakura were both dozing off with their backs on a tree, and Naruto, of all people, was meditating. He shook his head with a small laugh. This laugh made Sasuke and Sakura wake up, but Naruto seemed impervious to the sound. Sakura noticed that, and gave Naruto a push that pulled him out of his meditative state.<p>

"You're late, sensei. Again." Naruto said, with a cold glare.

"Ah well you see, I had to help an old lady cross the street, and then she asked me to carry her groceries back home for her, and she actually lived all the way across the village." He said while eye-smiling at them. His three students all sweat dropped at their sensei's antics.

"Anyway, moving on to the test." Kakashi said dramatically, while taking out two bells out of his supply pouch, which he tied to his side "You have to get these two bells from me, before noon. Whoever gets a bell passes. Whoever doesn't get sent back to the academy, for another full year as gennin." He said, enjoying the shocked looks on Sasuke and Sakura's faces while Naruto seemed to be in deep thought. 'Good, it seems like someone is finally thinking.' He picked a clock out of his supply pouch, walked to the wooden posts and set it to noon.

"You have one hour until noon. GO!" he yelled, which was a cue for his students to disappear. He snickered and took out his favorite book from his supply pouch. He walked to the open fields of the training ground, making sure he was visible from all sides. He was about to be absorbed in his book when he felt something a few meters away from him. He slowly lowered his book and saw Naruto standing right opposite of him, with his hands crossed.

"Hn, it seems like someone hasn't learned anything at the academy at all. Haven't you're teachers taught you that standing right in front of an enemy of unknown power is dangerous?" he said, looking at the blonde dead in the eye.

"I'm not the weak kid you think I am, Kakashi-sensei. I have changed during this week, and I'm a lot stronger than I was before. I will pass this stupid test of yours and I _will _become Hokage!" he said pointing his hand at him.

With that, Naruto closed his eyes, concentrating his chakra, before closing the distance between him and Kakashi in a burst of speed.

* * *

><p>Yeah, as you can guess, I did not want to reveal a single detail about Naruto's skill development during the week.<br>Again I'm sorry for not updating in so long. I'll have the next chapter up as soon as possible.

~6Vor6kas6


	7. Author's note 1

AUTHORS NOTE.

I Have completely scrapped the old legend idea, because frankly, it was just a cliché that I put there because I thought it looked nice in the description. My concept of the 'legend' was really stupid, as I wasn't that mature at the time I thought about this idea. Don't worry, this won't affect the story one bit, I will just remove the 1 single paragraph that describes that Kaeos dude. I don't think anyone remembers him anyway.

Thank you for your time.

~6Vor6kas6


	8. Team 7

Thank you for all your kind reviews. I've had a review mentioning Darui and his storm element, but as of now I decided to name that element the energy element, since it doesn't actually match the name storm, all he does is create energy beams which he can then control. The true storm element properties are a secret as of now(*wink*) and is a combination of wind, water and lightning, as opposed to lightning and water which is Darui's 'storm' element.

Anyway, thanks again for all your kind words. Read on!

Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto.

* * *

><p>Sasuke and Sakura stared in shock, as their team mate, who they thought had actually become smarter, blatantly challenged their <em>jounin<em> level sensei to a one on one fight. He seemed to have reverted to his old self over the course of the two minutes their sensei had spent talking to them. Sasuke seemed eager to see just what Naruto would do in a fight of those odds, while Sakura was looking at Naruto with a worried look. Kakashi-sensei wouldn't hurt Naruto, would he?

"One last thing!" they heard Kakashi say. "Come at me with the intent to kill, or don't come at me at all." He finished, while looking at Naruto with a bored look.

Naruto smirked, surprising Kakashi. "Is that supposed to be a taunt, sensei?" he said while slowly getting into a fighting stance. "If you really wish that I come at you with the intent to kill, then so be it!" He finished, while he disappeared from his team mates view. Kakashi followed his student's movement as he moved to block a kick. He was surprised to see that Naruto's kick missed him by a bare inch.

"Haha! You really are the dead last aren't you, can't land a single kick!" he taunted the blonde, hoping to get him to lose his focus. Naruto just smirked and launched himself at Kakashi a second time, this time he went for a chop on his sensei's chest. Again, Kakashi moved in for a block, and Naruto missed by an inch.

'What is the deal with this kid? He can't be that bad at aiming, can he?'

Naruto moved in again, aiming a kick for Kakashi's head. Kakashi moved his hands to protect his head, and just as the kick was about to connect, Kakashi noticed Naruto forcefully changing the course of his kick by an inch. Just as he noticed that, he noticed two other things. One, he heard a loud whoosh, as if Naruto's kick had generated enough power to actually move the air around it, and second, that Naruto's kicks stinged like a bitch.

'What the hell is this? His kicks didn't even connect, yet I feel pain, like if he had hit my hand dead on.' He saw Naruto smirk again, and then his eyes widened. He looked at all the parts of his body Naruto was aiming for. His eyes widened in shock, as he saw blood oozing out of his hands, and he was even more shocked to find a large slash mark across his jounin vest.

'What the hell is this, I can't see any blades in his hands or on his boots, so what the hell produced these slashes?'

"Stings, doesn't it?" Naruto said with a smirk. He unsheathed his ninjato and held it in front of him in a basic kenjutsu stance. Kakashi could clearly see that Naruto was concentrating chakra in the blade. Naruto then moved his hands, while Kakashi braced for an attack, but he was surprised when he saw Naruto throw his ninjato at the nearest tree.

'What the hell is he doing, why would he get rid of his weapon like that?' his thoughts were interrupted by what he saw next. The ninjato tore through the tree bark like a hot knife in butter, and landed deep in the ground at the other side of the tree. He could feel his jaw dropping at Naruto's performance. Then his mind finally clicked. The loud whooshing, the amazing cutting skills…

"Wind Chakra?" he questioned Naruto, to which Naruto only nodded. Kakashi raised his brow as Naruto seemed to pull in the air, but raised both as he saw the ninjato returning to his owner via the now identified chakra string.

"How can a kid your age, and most of all, your grade level, be able to control wind chakra to that extent. It's impossible; you'd need years of training to achieve that!" Kakashi said while looking at Naruto carefully. He was about to speak up again, but he was interrupted, as he moved to block an incoming attack from his side. He turned to his attacker and was surprised to see another Naruto coming at him, about to kick his head. Kakashi was not one to fall for the same trick after seeing it enough times, and actually punched Naruto's kick away , carefully placing his body so it wasn't in the way of Naruto's foot. He then kicked the second Naruto on his exposed back, making him poof away.

"Ah, so a mere gennin has actually made use of the Kage Bunshin's second property. And I would guess that with your chakra pool, you could make hundreds of them." He said, already knowing the answer. All jounin level shinobi and up had been informed on the happening of the Mizuki incident but Naruto's possible use of clones for training had slipped his mind.

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><p>'What the hell is this, two Naruto's? That can't be a simple bunshin; the sound of Kakashi's punch hitting Naruto's kick was certainly not an illusion. So how can these clones be physical, and how the hell did Naruto learn to control wind chakra?' Sasuke thought, watching Naruto's fight carefully. This was his chance to unravel the blonde mystery, and he was going to learn as much of the blondes skills as possible.<p>

Sakura watched the fight with a worried look on her face, which changed to a shocked expression rather quickly. 'When did Naruto become so strong?' she thought. '_Hell, he could even beat us at this level!' _replied her inner self. She was actually surprised to hear from her inner self again. It had shut up after Naruto had talked to her with such coldness after class, and she had spent a whole day without her inner self's rumblings.

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><p>Naruto said nothing in reply to his sensei's words, as he moved his hands to his chest, forming the cross shaped sign that signaled the appearance of 4 clones around him. He and his clones charged at Kakashi, moving at low chuunin speeds, while spreading out to circle Kakashi. One of the clones moved in for a kick to the legs, while another went for a chop to Kakashi's shoulder. Kakashi disappeared, reappearing behind the clone aiming for his shoulder, giving him a chop it a chop to the neck, making it poof out of existence. But while he was dealing with that clone, the one aiming for his legs repositioned itself, and moved in for a hit again, this time going for a kick to the chest. Kakashi moved again to intercept it, kicking it in the face, and turning at the last second to receive a gash across his arm, from a third clone, that came out from the smoke of the first clone. He punched that clone in the face, making it puff away, and jumped away to catch his breath. Now he was facing two Naruto's, but it seemed that Naruto had other plans, as he formed the seal again, making another 8 clones appear. The clones moved around Kakashi and circled him, all staring at him intently, to which he responded with a bored look.<p>

'If the dead last of the class is giving me so much trouble, I'd hate to see what Sasuke has to offer.'

Deciding to surprise Naruto, Kakashi disappeared from view, reappearing behind one of the clones, his body already in motion for a roundhouse kick, which launched the clone unto another clone, making them both poof away. Hearing a whooshing sound behind him, Kakashi sunk low into the ground, making one of the clones fly past him, his face in a shock expression, as he hit another clone, making them poof away as well. Kakashi turned to see three clones making their way towards him at low chuunin level speeds, to which he responded by appearing next to them, and hitting one of the clones with a punch to the chest, launching him towards the other clones. One of the clones was hit, making it poof away, while the other jumped up in the air, avoiding the hit. Kakashi looked up and saw the clone forming a short sequence of hand seal while filling its lungs with air.

**(A/N: Jutsu will go like this: the element will be yelled out in Japanese, since they are known words, but the jutsu will be in English, to avoid stupid pseudo-Japanese translations.)**

"Fuuton: Wind Bullet!" it yelled, while Kakashi widened his eyes. He saw a large air bullet flying towards him, but Kakashi smirked under his mask, a plan already forming in his head.

Naruto heard a poofing sound, and he looked up in surprise to see Kakashi where his clone had been. He looked back at where Kakashi had been, and his eyes widened when he saw his clone being hit by its own jutsu. Before any of the clones could react, Kakashi had disappeared once again, appearing behind one of the clones and giving it a chop to the neck, before appearing behind the other clone and doing the same. He then faced Naruto and stared at him straight in the eye.

"Well what are you going to do now?" Kakashi taunted.

Naruto smirked and formed a series of hand seals at incredible speeds. Kakashi recognized the hand seals, having copied the jutsu back in the day. He braced himself for what was to come, deciding to let the jutsu hit him, to see what Naruto would do next.

"Fuuton: Great Breakthrough!" Naruto yelled. At first nothing really happened, but then, the winds around Naruto started to pick up. Kakashi saw a gust of wind coming towards him, and the debris that was flying with it blocked a large part of his view. He used chakra to stick himself to the ground, trying to avoid damage from the flying debris, until the winds finally calmed down.

He looked towards Naruto, but found nothing there.

'Hm, smart kid, he used the technique as a cover so he could get away.' He smiled under his mask. 'Well, I can't give all this attention to Naruto; I better go check on the others as well.' And with that thought he disappeared in a swirl of leaves.

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><p>Sasuke saw Kakashi disappear which put him on edge. It seemed like Kakashi had tested Naruto enough, and now he was going to go for either him or Sakura, so the question was, which one of them would be first. He was about to turn around, when he felt a hand touch his shoulder. He immediately hit the hand, and span in place, his hands ready to attack if needed. He was relieved to see blonde hair, so he relaxed his hands.<p>

"What do you want?" Sasuke said, glaring at Naruto.

"I think I figured out the purpose of this test." Naruto said, looking at Sasuke carefully.

"Hn, do you really expect me to listen to the dead last on something related to thinking? You may have got a little stronger, but you're still a dobe." He said with a smirk

Naruto narrowed his eyes at Sasuke's words. Before Sasuke could react, he felt Naruto's cold hands against his neck, and he felt himself being slammed against a tree.

"What I want is for you to listen to me, before dismissing me as the 'dobe'. I have changed Sasuke, and I won't let you underestimate me anymore!" he yelled. "I'm tired of people underestimating me, and I won't take this shit from anyone!" Sasuke looked directly in Naruto's eyes. His eyes widened when he saw his eyes flash red for a second, before returning to deep blue. Naruto's words echoed in his head. Maybe it was time to let go of old habits that they had in class. He would just prove his superiority in combat, instead of class tests. He felt Naruto relax his grip, letting him go. He steadied himself on the branch, before looking at Naruto.

"Fine. I'm listening" he said. Naruto gave a slight smile, before his eyes grew serious.

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><p>Sakura was still slack jawed from Naruto's performance. A few months back, she was confident that she could beat Naruto with one hand behind her back, that's how bad she thought he was at everything. But now, with this performance, Naruto had dismissed any doubts she had about him being stronger than her, and maybe, he was as strong as Sasuke.<p>

She heard a noise, and whipped her head around, letting out a breath of relief as she saw nothing. She moved out of the bush she was hiding in and started walking towards the direction she had seen Sasuke go. If anything they had a better chance of passing this together, than alone. Kakashi-sensei had completely destroyed Naruto and she doubted that was the limit of his strength. Not one of them could take him on alone, no matter how strong. She was lost in her thoughts when she heard a noise.

"Hey Sakura!" she heard, and then she saw black.

* * *

><p>Sakura woke up a few minutes, her head spinning. She sat up, and noticed she was in a different place than where she blacked out. The voice she heard before she blacked out belonged to Kakashi, so he probably carried her here. What was he aiming for? Was this some kind of trap?<p>

She slowly got up, and looked around her. She seemed to be in a clearing that was surrounded by some trees. She heard shuffling around some bushed behind her so she whipped her head around, ready for an attack. What she saw shocked her to the core. Sasuke was crawling out of the bushes, and he had kunai, swords, and shuriken stuck all over him, draining his blood drop by drop.

"S-S-Sakura…h-hel-lp me…" Sasuke spat some blood on the ground. He then collapsed to the ground, probably out of blood loss. Sakura stared wide eyed at him as her brain was processing what she had just seen.

'I mustn't panic, I'm one of the top in class at first aid, I should be able to keep him alive long enough to get him to a hospital. If I panic we might lose him, if I don't there's a chance of saving Sasuke-kun!' she thought hurriedly while rushing to Sasuke. She was running for a few seconds before she stopped. Sasuke wasn't any closer than he was a few seconds ago.

'Just what the hell is going on here?' she looked around her trying to see what was going on. Her eyes landed on Sasuke for a second time. Then she noticed it. One of the swords had pierced his heart and another of them his throat. He wouldn't be able to crawl, let alone speak to her. Something weird was going on here. And then her mind clicked.

"Genjutsu!" She exclaimed. She brought her hands up to her chest. She formed a hand seal, and released a burst of chakra. "Kai!"

With that the Genjutsu dispersed and she was standing right where she had blacked out. She saw Kakashi standing a few meters away from her, looking at her carefully.

"Well,well,well, I didn't expect you to get out of the Genjutsu so fast. I would think that you would've passed out after seeing your 'Sasuke-kun' in such a horrible situation."

Sakura saw red, charging at Kakashi, her fist raised for a punch. She punched Kakashi, but he caught it with his open palm.

'Wow, she can sure pack some force behind her punches, I think I felt one of my finger bones crack.'

Sakura followed up her punch with a kick to Kakashi's side. Kakashi was pushed to the side by the sheer force of the kick. Sakura pulled out a kunai out of her supply pouch, and held it in front of her. She made a hand seal and 3 bunshin appeared behind her. They charged towards Kakashi.

'What is this, does she really think a seasoned jounin is going to fall for that?' he thought in disbelief.

He charged at the bunshin, but as he ran through the bunshin, he saw Sakura's kunai a few inches from his stomach. In a flash, he moved a little to the side, and pushed her hand away from him. Sakura lost her balance because of this and fell headfirst into the ground. Kakashi stood above Sakura, looking at her with a bored look.

"Well, then, since you seem to be done, I'll go check on Sasuke to see what he's capable of." He turned around and was about to disappear when he heard something behind him.

"Fuuton : Wind Bullet!"

Kakashi's eyes widened at that, whipping his head around, just in time to see the wind bullet about a meter away from him. The wind bullet raised a lot of dust clouds as it whizzed closer and closer to Kakashi. Kakashi was enveloped by the dust as the wind bullet hit him. Naruto and Sakura saw a log flying outside the dust cloud, which signaled that Kakashi had used substitution. Naruto looked around and tried to find Kakashi. He heard a sound behind him and immediately span in place, his ninjato already in his hands. He saw Kakashi coming at him at a speed that he couldn't follow, and raised his ninjato in a defensive stance. Kakashi was 1 meter away from Naruto, his fist already ready to punch Naruto in the gut, while his other hand was ready to push Naruto's ninjato away. Naruto smirked, as another voice yelled.

"Katon: Great Fireball!"

Kakashi's eyes widened as he turned around to see a giant ball of flame coming at him at high speeds. He was about to jump away when he felt someone grab him from behind, holding him in place. Kakashi's eyes widened even more.

'What is this kid doing, is he suicidal?' he thought frantically as the fireball got closer and closer.

The fireball hit Kakashi straight on, creating a blast that blinded Sasuke and Sakura. When the smoke from the blast cleared, they saw Naruto holding a burned log. Naruto proceeded to poof out of existence, signaling that he was a shadow clone. Sasuke smirked as Kakashi stood opposite of him. Before Kakashi could do anything, Sasuke charged at him with high speeds, before he jumped and delivered a roundhouse kick to Kakashi's head. His leg was caught by Kakashi's arm, but that didn't faze Sasuke. He followed his kick by bringing his knee to Kakashi's face , hitting him on the chin, making Kakashi lose his balance. He let Sasuke go, and immediately brought his hands to the bells to protect them from Sasuke. His eyes widened when he felt nothing touch his hands. Sasuke stood in front of him, his hands crossed, a smirk on his face. He pointed behind Kakashi. Kakashi turned around to see Naruto sitting next to Sakura, his hand outstretched, holding the two bells. He snickered a little at Kakashi's face.

Kakashi looked at Naruto slack jawed.

"When?" he finally said.

"When I grabbed you from behind. I took the bells, and when you substituted with the log, I substituted with a clone I had stationed in the trees above." he said with a slight smile.

Sakura looked at them in disbelief as she tried to process what was going on. Naruto had both bells in his hand. Did that mean that she and Sasuke had failed the test?

Naruto noticed Sakura's concerned face, and as if he had read her mind, he shook his head.

"No Sakura, you didn't fail the test. The test was all about team work. I mean, have you ever heard of a gennin team with two gennin and one jounin?" he said.

Sakura went in thought for a little, before it all dawned on her.

They heard clapping from Kakashi's direction. They turned to see Kakashi eye smiling and clapping at them.

"Good job. You're the first team in all my years of being a jounin that actually looked underneath the underneath and found the hidden purpose in my test. This test served the purpose to show you that team work helps you defeat tougher opponents. Not one of you could take on a full-fledged jounin and win, and yet together, you surpassed yourselves and got the bells. Team work is valued more than anything, especially within Konoha. And here, quoting an old friend, I'll say this to you: Those who disobey the rules are scum, but those who abandon their friends, are worse than scum." He looked at them in the eyes. "I proudly instate you guys as Team 7!" he said with an eye smile.

Naruto grinned and Sasuke smirked, while Sakura gave a gentle smile. She had finally become a gennin. And she was going to train. She was going to train harder than ever, so she could prove that she could become a strong ninja, that she wasn't just a weak fangirl.

"Starting tomorrow, we'll meet here in this very training ground, at 8 AM sharp. Team dismissed!" and with that he disappeared in a swirl of leaves, his favorite book already in his hands.

There was one thought in his mind as he disappeared.

'I have a feeling these kids will make one hell of a team.'

He smiled behind his book as he disappeared, feeling excited for the days to come.

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><p>I know, not much of an ending to a chapter, but I toyed around and this was the best I could do. Well, that concludes Chapter 7, thank you for reading. Review if you liked it. Cheers.<p>

~6Vor6kas6


	9. Training

Here's another chapter for you guys. I got some more reviews, and since they're all generally positive, it just gives me the motivation to write more. Now moving on to address something I've received in a couple of reviews and PMs, Yes, the storm element can generally be considered a Kekkei tota, _if _Kekkei tota means three elements combined. _But_ Kekkei tota are not only elemental bloodlines. The only known Kekkei tota _is_ an elemental bloodline, but it is not limited to that. Kekkei tota is an advanced form of the Kekkei genkai. Information on it is scarce, but even if the only known Kekkei tota is the dust element (earth, wind, and fire combination.) we can't assume that Kekkei tota are only limited to elemental bloodlines.

Moving on to address an issue I see coming up after you read this chapter: Kakashi is actually teaching in this story (Wow, I know right?) and Sakura is going to start training, finally. Sasuke will be tolerable, but I have yet to decide his final fate (traitor/no traitor).

Again thank you guys for the kind reviews, it's what keeps me motivated to write.

Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto.

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><p>Loud noises could be heard in training ground 7. This was a normal occurrence for the past three weeks, ever since Team 7 had officially passed Kakashi's bell test. Ever since that day, the team had been taking on D-rank missions, completing more than 3 each morning, which was a lot if one were to consider that Kakashi arrived two hours late to the team meeting, with the help of Naruto's clones. The villagers were reluctant to let twenty replica's of <em>that<em> kid do their chores, but in the end, they were so satisfied by team 7's speed in completing the mission that they didn't say anything to Naruto. One would argue that having clones complete the missions was missing the point, which was to build team work. Kakashi had said that they only needed to complete enough to be eligible for the chuunin exams and enough so they could get higher ranked missions. For now, they built team work through training.

After the morning missions, the team would always go to the training ground to train. Sasuke and Sakura trained from the minute they entered the training ground, until late in the night while Naruto would usually leave after some time so he could go train with Yuugao. So far, Kakashi had taught them basic team work exercises, slowly building their teamwork to the point where they worked like a well oiled machine. He had also taught them the tree climbing exercise, and the water walking exercise. Naruto had skipped all the sessions that involved those exercises, opting to go elsewhere and train on his elemental manipulation, or train with Yuugao, if she was available.

At the moment, the blonde was panting in front of a large tree, his hands on his knees. He was looking intently at the tree. He closed his eyes in concentration, and after a few seconds, he snapped them open. He raised his hand above his head, and brought it forward in a swiping motion. While his hand was coming down, thick chakra strings sprung out from his finger tips. Naruto closed his eyes in concentration, as the chakra strings took a greenish-white color. He finished his swipe, and opened his eyes to look at his handy work. The tree had 5 slash marks, all of them 5 centimeters deep. He looked at his handiwork, before he grinned.

'Now, I just need to improve the time it takes to channel wind chakra through the whole thing, and make it thinner, and I've got myself my first original technique.' He thought with a smile. He had been working on this one with the help of his clones for well over a week, and he was finally getting there.

He turned around and looked towards where Sasuke and Sakura were training. Sasuke was shooting all kinds of fire jutsu at Sakura, and Sakura was dodging around, trying to avoid everything. Every once in a while she would throw down an earth wall, so she could block a couple of attacks while she got her breath back.

Naruto looked at her while he remembered the day Kakashi had given them all chakra papers.

_**Flashback:**_

Kakashi was standing in front of his three students. They had been his students for three days now, and he was excited about them. At first he had thought that this team would be a pain, as he had the arrogant Sasuke, the fan girl Sakura and the obnoxious knucklehead Naruto. Instead, the Uchiha was calm, actually communicating with his team, and he seemed to treat Naruto with respect where it was needed, Sakura was also very calm, she spoke to Sasuke a lot, as expected, but, ever since her new found desire to train, Sasuke seemed to tolerate her a lot more, and even helped her in training. Naruto couldn't be more different than his file described him to be. Instead of an obnoxious knucklehead, he had a calm, calculative student, that was highly skilled, as if he was training for years (the clones were helping, indeed.) and he seemed to get along with his team. He still had his hyperactive outbursts, but they were contained to outside missions or training. The kid was by no means a genius, but he seemed a lot smarter than what his file said. He guessed Yuugao had something to do with that.

At the moment he had three chakra papers in his hands, and he was holding them out for his students to see.

"Do you know what these are?"

"Yes, Kakashi-sensei. Those are standard issue chakra papers, made from the special trees fed with chakra, that grow in the forests of Konoha. The trees are fed with chakra as they grow, and the paper they produce develops the ability to detect the elemental affinity in one's chakra, if said person were to channel chakra in the paper. Fire burns the paper, Lightning crumbles it, Earth turns it into dust, Wind cuts the paper, and Water soaks it. " Sakura said, as if reciting the whole thing from the book. "The paper actually reacts to elemental bloodlines as well, but the book that I read on the subject had nothing on what the reactions were to the different known elemental bloodlines.

"Good work Sakura, looks like someone's done their reading!" he praised Sakura to which she responded with a smile. "Well, since you know so much about chakra papers, why don't you go first?" He said while he handed her the first chakra paper.

Sakura held it up, while she concentrated her chakra. The paper instantly turned to dust, showing just how strong Sakura's affinity was towards earth. She looked at her team mates with a smile, a smile which Naruto returned while Sasuke looked at her indifferently.

"Hm, earth affinity. I've got a lot of jutsu in my arsenal to teach you Sakura. I copied a lot of earth jutsu over the years, as it is a very common affinity within the Five Great Shinobi Nations second only to water." Kakashi said with a smile. He had already told them about his sharingan and how he copied jutsu, after Naruto questioned him on his bingo book entry, as the man who had copied over a thousand jutsu. He motioned for Sasuke to take the next chakra paper.

Sasuke took the next chakra paper from Kakashi's hand, holding it in front of him like Sakura did. He concentrated for a moment, and then, the chakra paper crumbled into a little ball, showing his strong affinity towards lightning, and then it burst into flames, forcing him to let it drop to the ground, instantly putting the fire out.

"Hm, a strong affinity towards lightning, and an affinity towards fire as well. A gennin with two elemental affinities, now there's something you don't see every day. The fire part is to be expected from one of the Uchiha clan, but lightning is _quite _rare in these parts of the Elemental Nations." Kakashi said while looking at Sasuke. Sasuke smirked, pleased to see that he was ahead of Naruto on this one. Or so he thought.

Naruto took the last chakra paper while looking at it reluctantly. Yuugao had made him use this once, and he didn't want to show this in front of his team mates, as they would start asking questions, the reaction of the paper was just too strong. He looked at his team mates, eager to see what Naruto's elements were. He held it in front of him, and pushed his chakra into it. The paper's reaction left Kakashi, Sasuke, and Sakura slack jawed. First, the paper became soaked in water, showing an affinity towards water. Then, the paper crumbled, but the interesting part was that there were visible lightning currents travelling around the soaked paper, showing an incredibly strong lightning affinity. Then the paper was shredded into dozens of little pieces, showing an even stronger wind affinity. Then, the most peculiar thing happened. The small paper pieces gathered together on Naruto's palm and started spinning very fast. The end result was a black clouded mini tornado on top of Naruto's palm, which blew the small paper pieces away. Naruto looked up from his palm, trying to hold his laugh as he saw his team mate's faces.

"Ok, so" Kakashi was the first to recover. "You have an affinity towards water, a very strong affinity towards lightning, and a very, _very_, strong affinity towards wind. Not only are you a gennin with three different basic elemental affinities, you seem to have a fourth one as well, which I don't seem to recognize. Just what the hell was that black tornado?" he asked Naruto, his eyes still wide by what he had just witnessed.

Naruto unsheathed his sword without a word, pointing the blunt side with the kanji towards Kakashi. Kakashi looked at it for a second before his eyes got even wider.

"I'm guessing that storm is a combination of your other elemental affinities?" he said, to which Naruto nodded.

"Well, over powered, god gifted gennin aside, You've all got affinities which I can help you with, except your wind and storm nature, Naruto, but I'm sure Yuugao is helping you with that." He said looking at Naruto, to which Naruto nodded. Kakashi then proceeded to look between Sasuke and Naruto "Ok so I'll just make a Kage bunshin to train Sakura, and I can get you guys started on lightning affinity training." He continued. A Kage Bunshin appeared next to him without any sort of handsigns or words. "Shall we?" he motioned for Sasuke and Naruto to follow him, as his clone took Sakura a little ways away towards a rockier portion of training ground 7.

**:Flashback.**

Indeed, Kakahi had taught them all a lot of things in the short while that they had been a team. Naruto and Sasuke were progressing slowly in lightning control. Naruto was using his clones outside of team training to boost his lightning control. That led to Sasuke being jealous of his fast progressing, which he responded to by pushing himself even more. Naruto was amazed by Sasuke's will. He was around his level in lightning control, and he was using 50 clones a day to help him with his lightning control for two hours. Kakashi had shown Naruto a few water jutsu, and water control exercises, and Sasuke a few fire ninjutsu. Sakura on the other hand, was improving with leaps and bounds. Her chakra was triple what it was before, and her stamina at least double, which wasn't really saying much. She had become really good at manipulating earth chakra, probably due to the fact that she had insanely good chakra control. Kakashi had taught her a few defensive and offensive earth jutsu as well, and she was making full use of them at the moment, against Sasuke.

He was pulled out of his thoughts when he heard Sakura yell out a technique.

"Doton: Spike Graveyard!"

A giant spike of gray rock rose below Sasuke at blindingly fast speeds, forcing him to dodge. Sasuke had seen this technique more than once, so he was prepared for the next spike that tried to impale him while he was landing from his dodge, forcing him to dodge yet again. This went on for a few seconds, Sasuke dodging a total of 7 earth spikes, which was Sakura's limit, before Sakura collapsed to her knees in exhaustion. Sasuke was behind her with a kunai on her neck before she could blink.

"Looks like I won again Sakura." He said with a confident smirk. Sakura looked down at that, disappointed. Naruto shot Sasuke a look, and Sasuke returned it, before he turned to Sakura again. "But you've come closer than any time before. If only you had conserved your chakra, and used it more efficiently than spending most of it on the Spike Graveyard, then you had a solid chance of winning our little spar." He said reluctantly, making Sakura look up with a smile. Sasuke smiled lightly at that, and Naruto grinned as he watched the two from afar. They had really made Sasuke come out of his shell. The boy truly seemed to have no idea on how to interact on a friendly basis with his team mates, so Naruto had made it his duty to help the boy, after he noticed how hard it was for Sasuke to maintain his image of a cocky, strong, and respectable gennin, while also interacting with his team. Kakashi had made it clear on their first official meeting as a team that absolute communication was a necessity if they were to be a team.

"So Sasuke, have you got enough chakra for another spar?" he said, winking at his raven-haired team mate.

Sasuke responded by popping a soldier pill in his mouth, closing his eyes as the soldier pill filled his chakra reserves.

"Now, I do." He responded with a smirk.

Sakura moved and sat at the base of a tree far from the two gennin, knowing that they caused massive destruction whenever they 'sparred'. Naruto walked towards Sasuke, and when he got close, he raised his fist, to which Sasuke responded by bumping it. This was always their way of initiating spars.

Both of them disappeared as soon as their hands parted, reappearing a few seconds later above the sky in a clash of kunai and ninjato. They remained in that position as Naruto pushed against Sasuke's two kunai. They disappeared again and they reappeared this time with Sasuke in the attacking position and Naruto on the defensive. This kept repeating itself for a little while as they danced around the training ground as they kept disappearing and reappearing switching between attacking and defending fluidly. As they reappeared again, Naruto moved for an uppercut, forcing Sasuke to hold his kunai above him. Sasuke blocked Naruto's ninjato, but didn't expect Naruto's knee connecting with his chin. He jumped away, still disoriented from the hit, as he scowled at Naruto. He saw Naruto flashing through hand seals, and he did the same. They cried their respective techniques at the same time.

"Katon: Flame Bullet!/Suiton: Water Bullet!"

The two techniques clashed in midair, instantly evaporating and causing steam to appear everywhere, clouding the training ground. Sasuke didn't expect the second water bullet that came out of the smoke, so he was hit dead on by it. The high pressured water slammed Sasuke on a large tree, near them. Sasuke got up, shaking his head to get rid of the dizziness. He looked at Naruto for a second, before he smirked and disappeared from view. Naruto disappeared from view as well as they met in the middle of the distance, and engaged in a fast paced taijutsu battle. Naruto moved in with a kick, going for Sasuke's ribs. Sasuke, who had seen the boy's wind infused taijutsu way too many times to be caught off guard, used a chakra infused step, to get inside of Naruto's kick, and after using a chakra infused chop to push the kick away, he reared his fist back and hit Naruto straight in the gut. The punch forced the boy to exhale the air in his lungs in a reflex attempt to lessen the pain, but then Sasuke realized his mistakes. He jumped away from Naruto, blood trailing down his arm, several deep gashes clearly visible. Naruto had transformed the air he was forced to exhale into wind blades, and had turned the obvious bad situation into a huge advantage. Before Sasuke could catch his breath, Naruto charged at him, and as he was getting closer and closer, he disappeared from view, and appeared in the air, right behind Sasuke, his leg already in the motion for a roundhouse kick. Sasuke caught Naruto's motion from the corner of his eye's and sunk low in the ground, making Naruto fly above him, his momentum rendering him unable to react to Sasuke's sudden dodge. Sasuke took this opportunity to use his bent legs to launch himself at Naruto; his knee ready to cause massive damage to Naruto's exposed back. As Sasuke was a few inches away from Naruto, a shadow clone appeared right below Naruto. Sasuke was stunned at the display, as he had never seen Naruto do a wordless and seal-less shadow clone. Naruto used the shadow clone to launch himself up in the air, effectively avoiding Sasuke's fatal attack. The clone then grabbed Sasuke from behind, to which Sasuke responded with an elbow which made it poof out of existence. Sasuke looked up in the sky, expecting to see Naruto, but he found nothing. He felt a change in the wind, and turned around a kunai in his hand, and found Naruto pointing his hidden blade a few centimeters from his neck. But Sasuke's kunai was also at Naruto's neck, a result of his reflex action before hand.

"So, we'll call it a tie then?" Naruto said, a smirk plastered on his face.

Sasuke looked at Naruto with slightly widened eyes. If someone asked him four weeks ago if the blond was of any note, Sasuke would point to a bug, and state that the bug was probably stronger than Naruto in any way possible. But now, Naruto was equal to Sasuke in probably every way, and maybe even stronger. There were still a lot of the boy's skills that he didn't know about. Sasuke was no idiot; he knew that the only reason why this was a tie was because his keen senses picked up on Naruto. If he had been a split second late, Naruto would have had his blade pressed against his neck, and he would have lost the spar. But nearly losing this match didn't make him feel as jealous as he thought it would. Naruto's increasing power didn't make him jealous; it resulted in a mutual respect between the two. Sasuke had become a lot stronger ever since he went into Team 7. Naruto's power had been fueling his training, but Naruto helped him become a lot stronger as well. Sasuke had learned to accept the blonds help, as he noticed that Naruto's insight helped him complete his training exercises much faster.

Sakura looked at her team mates with a smile. They had changed a lot ever since they became a team; they had changed her a lot, for the better. If she battled her old self now, she could probably squish her with one hand behind her back. Kakashi-sensei had a lot to do with her change, but her team mates were what kept her motivated to continue training and become even stronger. She didn't want to be left out, did she?

Kakashi watched over his team, hidden from view, up on a tree branch. He was really pleased to see that his team was bonding and he was also pleased by their increasing power as well. He just couldn't wait to see every one's faces during the Chuunin exams when the team that was supposed to be the drop-out team, the one that had absolutely no team work and all power in the team was concentrated in the Uchiha, kicked all their arses. He had told his team not to flaunt their power for this exact reason.

He had just the thing to reward his team for their hard efforts. He was on his way to announce it but he saw them sparring so he decided to watch. He watched both Sasuke and Sakura's spar, and Naruto's and Sasuke's spar, and he was extremely pleased by what he saw.

He jumped down, landing next to Sakura, startling all of them. They turned to him, their weapon's raised, or in Sakura's case, her fists raised, but relaxed when they saw the familiar mop of gray hair, and his signature mask.

"Yo!" he said with a half wave. His team all nodded, waiting to hear what he wanted to say. They were used to his tardiness, but this time he was extremely late, so something important must've come up. "As a reward for your hard training, I managed to secure something very exciting for you guys." He continued, drawing the secret out for as long as possible, loving the built up suspense. Naruto and Sakura perked up at this, and Sasuke seemed more focused on his words. "I managed to secure your first C-rank mission as a team." He finished, amused at his team's reactions. Naruto had jumped on Sasuke and was hugging him while screaming his lungs out, Sasuke looked very distressed about Naruto's antics, and Sakura was jumping up and down, screaming her lungs out as well. They really hated those D-ranks, didn't they?

"Your job is to protect a very important bridge builder, Tazuna, as he makes his trip back to the Land of Waves and then we'll protect him while he completes this 'super' big bridge that he is building. The predicted length of this mission is about three weeks or more since we'll be travelling in civilian speeds, and we'll have to wait for the bridge to finish. We're meeting him tomorrow morning at the village gates, 8 AM sharp. Don't be late" he finished and with that he shunshined away.

Naruto looked at Sakura and Sasuke with a smile.

"Well, I'm going to go home and pack, and I'll probably sleep early tonight. See you guys tomorrow morning" he finished, disappearing in a shunshin as well. He had begged Yuugao to teach him the shunshin, and she did, a few days ago.

* * *

><p>Naruto was jumping along the rooftops of Konoha, a smile on his face. He had been waiting for this C-rank for a long time. It would be the first time he had ever gone out of the village borders, and this excited him a lot. He couldn't wait to meet new people, and see the world outside the village borders.<p>

He already had all the stuff he needed packed inside a small scroll in his supply pouch. At the moment it was time for dinner, and he was going to Yuugao's place to see if she wanted to go with him on his last night in the village. He landed right outside Yuugao's apartment, and he proceeded to knock on her door. He waited for a few seconds, until he heard the knob turn, and he saw Gekko Hayate standing at the door. He smiled as pointed his fist at the man and he gave him a grin as he bumped it with his own.

He had met the man two weeks ago, when Yuugao told him about her new boyfriend. Apparently Yuugao and Gekko were in the same class in the academy, and Yuugao had had a crush on him ever since that time. Gekko had a crush on her as well but he was too embarrassed to ask, and so they waited all these years to confess to each other, and now they were truly happy together. When he had met Naruto, Gekko had seemed skeptic for a little, and who wouldn't be. After hearing so much about the Kyuubi's container, it was a really weird experience to meet him. But he and Naruto had hit it off after the first few minutes, making Yuugao very happy, as she was nervous about Gekko meeting Naruto. Gekko had joined them in a lot of the training session's they had, teaching Naruto more about taijutsu, and offensive kenjutsu. Yuugao herself was more focused on defensive kenjutsu, so Naruto was learning from both, creating his own preferred kenjutsu style. Gekko was extremely proficient in using the shadow clone jutsu in various situations, to gain a steady advantage over his enemies, and he was the reason Naruto could perform a wordless and seal less shadow clone.

(**A/N: I know about Gekko's coughing, but I'm not going to be mentioning it every sentence he speaks. It's annoying when you do it a lot. "Yes *cough* Yuugao-chan *cough**cough* I've read fics like that, and it's mighty annoying, so take his coughing as a given, I'm not even going to mention it.)**

"Naruto! Come in." he motioned inside with a smile as he turned his back on him and walked into the apartment. "Yuugao-chan, Naruto is here!" he yelled. Yuugao came from her room with a smile, her hair in a ponytail as she hugged Naruto.

"Naruto-kun, how was training?" she asked him while she moved to the kitchen. Naruto followed her there, all the while speaking.

"Well, it was ok, I sparred with Sasuke and we got in a tie, and I worked a little more on my lightning training. I think I found a way to implement water and lightning in my taijutsu style, but I'm going to need your help. But talking about my training is not what I'm here for." He finished, pulling a chair from the kitchen table and sitting on it, while looking at Yuugao. "I got my first C-rank today, and I'll be out of the village for at least three weeks. We're supposed to meet this bridge builder and escort him to the Land of Waves." He continued, but was halted by Gekko.

"Land of Waves? The Land of Waves has been under Gato's rule for over a year now." He said with a frown on his face.

"Who the hell is Gato?" asked Naruto with a questioning look.

"Naruto! I told you to read the book I gave you about modern day economics. If you don't know about Gato then you probably didn't read it, did you?" she said glaring at Naruto.

Naruto scratched his head nervously, but turned to Hayate as he started to speak.

"Gato is a major player in the Five Great Shinobi Nations. He is a major shipping magnate, and he is the founder of the Gato shipping industries. There's been word around that he's also involved in illegal drug dealing, but there's no proof of it at the moment. A few months ago, Konoha received intelligence that Gato had taken over the Land of Wave's and was terrorizing it's people, but we didn't receive any mission requests to take care of him. While Konoha is indeed a friendly village compared to the Mist, or Iwa, we don't do a lot for free, and we certainly don't assassinate major shipping magnates for free. The cost for doing that would be at least the cost of an A rank mission, and that is a lot of money. We can't just do it for free, so we are just observing Gato at the moment. If you received a mission request to go there, it either means that this bridge builder works for Gato, or that the bridge builder knows that he is in danger, but still hired a gennin team for a C rank, effectively putting you all in danger, as Gato has a lot of pull within the missing-nin, and bandit circles." He finished his long lecture with an even bigger frown. Yuugao watched the two's exchange, in deep thought.

Naruto looked carefully, analyzing the situation that Gekko had described to him.

"All right, I'll ask Kakashi-sensei about it tomorrow." He said finally, before he started talking to Gekko about the new technique he had been developing for a while now.

"Dinner is ready Gekko-kun, Naruto-kun! You _are_ going to eat here, right Naruto?" she said with an angry look, which calmed once she saw Naruto nod nervously.

Dinner was certainly not a quiet affair, what with Gekko and Naruto talking about new techniques, jutsu, and kenjutsu, and Yuugao joining the conversation every once in a while, and steering the conversation to new direction's once she was bored with the subject. Naruto noticed that she was in deep thought a lot of the time, but he didn't say anything about it, knowing that when Yuugao wasn't in a good mood, she wasn't going to tell anyone.

Finally, the time came for Naruto to leave, and he said his goodbyes to Gekko and Yuugao, before going out the door. He heard running behind him, and turned to see Yuugao standing at the door. Naruto looked at her questioningly.

"Good luck on your mission tomorrow, Naruto-kun. Be home safe, okay?" she said with a worried look.

Naruto nodded at her with a grin, but she surprised him by coming closer and kissing him on the forehead. "That's for good luck" she said with a smile, before going inside. She closed the door, as Naruto turned his back on her and jumped up towards a roof.

"You're really worried for him, aren't you?" Gekko said with a sympathizing look.

"Well, yeah, what you told him made me realize that this mission he's getting into, might not be exactly what it looks. And I can't really do anything about that, except sit here and wait for him to come back." She said with a frown.

Gekko seemed to be deep in thought, before his eyes widened a little, and he turned to Yuugao again.

"I'll see what I can do, tomorrow morning" he said before sealing her lips in a kiss.

* * *

><p>The next morning, Naruto arrived at the village gates early, eager to start his mission. He saw Sasuke already waiting there and after greeting him, he realized that Sasuke was even more eager than he was. They saw Sakura walking towards them, a smile on her face. She seemed eager to start the mission as well. Naruto would have expected her to be at least worried, but it seemed that he had underestimated the girl. While they waited for Kakashi to appear with their client, Naruto thought about what Gekko had told him the night before. He would indeed question Kakashi sensei on that piece of information when he arrived.<p>

They heard footsteps behind them, and they turned around surprised, as they didn't expect Kakashi to arrive this early. There was still half an hour left before the time he had told them to meet him.

Naruto's eyes widened at this new arrival.

* * *

><p>Yeah, that's the end of this chapter. First of all, I know that Sasuke and Sakura and Kakashi are kind of OOC, even after three weeks of being a team, but I prefer them this way, even if their change is kind of fast. Let's just say that Naruto has that effect on people, and leave it at that :)<p>

Thank you for reading, Review if you enjoyed. Or if you didn't. Haha, review either way, as it makes me happy :3.

~6Vor6kas6.


	10. Land of Waves pt 1

Well, I tried to put this chapter out before the 19th of July, but sadly I couldn't make it, and after that I had several back to back holidays in different cities, and this is the first chance that I had to write. Sorry for the long wait, but every few chapters, I might take these month breaks. It helps clear my mind and dive into writing with a renewed passion. If I continue writing without a break, it usually turns into a chore for me, no matter how much I love writing. Also, I just started playing Naruto Ultimate Ninja Storm Generations, so I've worked some on observing the characters different combo's and such, to maybe get some ideas on what to use in fights. So expect to see more organised fighting... I _hope_ haha!

Thank you for the kind reviews, it's really great reading them, and finding out you actually like this story of mine 3.

So, just to clarify something, Sasuke is a lot friendlier than in the anime, Kakashi is actually a teacher, not just a babysitter, and Sakura is actually a kunoichi. Crazy me right? Anyway, on with the story!

Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto.

* * *

><p>Naruto stared wide eyed at the new arrival, before he blinked and shook his head.<p>

"Gekko, what are you doing here?" Naruto said with a smile, happy to see the man again, before he left for his big mission.

"Well, Yuugao was worried about you, and I couldn't just stand there and watch." He started with a small smile. "So I went to the Hokage as soon as I woke up, and I talked to him about the information I gave you yesterday, and after some pleas I managed to do it." he said with a grin, feeling proud of himself.

"Do what?" Naruto asked.

"He's accompanying us on our mission to the Land of Waves." Said a new voice. They all turned to the direction the voice came from, and they saw Kakashi walking towards them, an old man with gray hair and a straw hat accompanying him. The man was obviously of the working class, his clothes betrayed him, and he was walking with a slight swagger. He was holding a sake bottle in one hand, and was holding a small bag over his back with his other hand.

"This is the team that's supposed to protect me? A sick jounin and a trio of snot nosed brats? The only respectable shinobi here is you, Kakashi-san."

"I assure you old man, that our team is more than capable of protecting you against the lowly bandits that you hired us to protect you from. Or are you expecting something stronger than bandits to be after you?" Naruto said with a pointed look. The man looked at his feet nervously for a moment, something Naruto, Kakashi, and Gekko didn't miss, before looking up again, his eyes fixed in a bored look.

"Whatever kid. My name is Tazuna. I'm a super important bridge builder and I was tasked with building the bridge that will connect the Land of Waves with the mainland, and your job is to escort me there and protect me while I build the bridge." He finished with a sagely nod.

"Whatever you say..." drawled Naruto with a bored look. He then turned to Gekko. "Anyway, drunken old men aside, how the hell did you manage to convince the Hokage to put you on the mission with us?" he said with a raised brow.

"Well the Hokage had no issue with me accompanying you guys, but formally he couldn't accept so he is sending me there on a B rank scouting mission while I accompany you on your way there." He finished with a smile. Naruto sent a look towards Tazuna, and he saw him looking at Gekko with a frown. When he caught Naruto looking at him, he quickly turned away.

"I don't trust him, Gekko. I don't think anyone would be so worried over simple bandits. There's someone far stronger after him." He told Gekko in a hushed tone.

"All right folks, you can chat while we're on the road. Keep your eyes open, and at the first sign of trouble, you _will_ circle the client, and protect him with your life, am I clear?" he asked with an intimidating look.

"Hai!" they chorused.

* * *

><p>Naruto was walking quietly next to Gekko, admiring the scenery around him. This was the first time he had ever gone out of the village, and he was going to enjoy every moment of it. At the moment, he and Gekko were walking a short distance in front of the team, scouting ahead for any possible trouble.<p>

Sakura and Sasuke were walking a short distance back, on each side of the client, while Kakashi was behind them, looking over all of them. Naruto heard Sakura speaking, so he focused some chakra in his ears to enhance his senses and listen to the conversation.

"So, what has the weather been like in these parts these last few days, Tazuna-san? I mean, you did pass through here when you came to Konoha, didn't you?"

"Well, it's been real hot around here for the past few weeks, not a single drop of rain from what I've heard. And it's really strange considering that the Land of Waves is not that far away, and it's constantly plagued by mists and humid weather."

Naruto tuned out the old man's blabbing. A short distance in front of them, there was a small puddle, underneath the shade of a tree. As they approached it, Naruto extended his chakra, and he felt an irregularity as it neared the puddle. This was a technique that Gekko had shown him a few days ago, and he wasn't even close to finishing it. Naruto narrowed his eyes in suspicion. Thinking back to what the old man said, his eyes widened for a moment before he turned to Gekko. He saw him nod at him. They slowed their pace down to meet that of the rest of the team. Naruto turned to them, focusing chakra in his ears so that he wouldn't be caught by surprise.

"Get ready, trouble's about to start." He said, before turning his head to look at the puddle. He didn't see Sasuke smirk, or Sakura widen her eyes. Sakura moved closer to Tazuna, her hand going for her kunai pouch, while Sasuke clenched his fists in anticipation. Naruto moved his hand to his back, grabbing the hilt of his ninjato. Gekko followed suit, only his hand moved towards the hilt of his Katana.

The puddle exploded outwards in a shower of water and smoke, and two figures emerged from it. Naruto and Gekko both unsheathed their weapons, and assumed their respective stances. Naruto looked at the attackers as they approached them. They seemed to be identical twins, and they were wearing identical metal gas masks, covering most of their faces. The only other noticeable thing about them was that they were both wearing giant clawed gloves on one hand, and the two gloves were connected by a bladed chain. Naruto widened his eyes as he observed that, because by the time he made that observation, their opponents had already circled them, and the bladed chain was coming closer and closer by the second. He put his back against Gekko's, watching as the bladed chain approached them. Naruto raised his ninjato above his head, and focused wind chakra in it. The blade started glowing green, and a blade of chakra was visible from it. He brought the blade down, just as the chain came into hitting distance. The blade stopped the chain, but Naruto watched as the chain on both his side came even closer. Gekko, acting fast, sheathed his Katana and drew two kunai, and stopped the chain at both sides.

The two were locked inside the bladed chains, and Naruto was pushing hard against the chain, while Gekko looked to be struggling to hold the chains. Naruto started pumping even more chakra into his blade, yelling as he started pushing against the chain, the blade digging through the incredibly strong metal, before he pushed one last time, letting a burst of chakra emerge from his blade. The blade of chakra cut through the chain like butter, and dug into the ground, until it created a huge slash mark in the ground.

The chains, losing their connection that was creating tension, fell loosely to the ground. The two ninja that were controlling the chains stumbled as the chains broke, but they regained their footing in a few seconds. The ninja looked at one another, and after a short nod, they both charged, the chains already detached from their clawed gauntlets. At this moment, Kakashi and Sasuke woke from their shock of seeing their student and teammate almost ripped to shreds, and they both charged at the enemy ninja. Gekko unsheathed his Katana for a final time, looking at the attackers with a calculating eye. Naruto charged at the enemy ninja with a calm look on his face. The first of the enemy ninja was already above Naruto with his glove raised above his head. Naruto raised his ninjato to block the enemy's gauntlet, locking them in position. Naruto saw the second ninja coming from the corner of his eyes, and he knew that he couldn't react in time. Just as the ninja was within hitting distance, he heard Sakura cry out a jutsu.

"Doton: Earth Spike!" she yelled as she slammed her hands on the ground.

A human sized earth spike rose from the earth next to Naruto, already pointed towards the attacking ninja. The ninja, caught by surprise, only barely dodged the spike, but he still received a fairly large gash to the side. The time that the earth spike had bought him and the surprise that it had caused to the first ninja was enough for Naruto to remove his blade from the gauntlet's grip, and jump up to head butt the ninja straight in the stomach. He watched as the ninja was thrown several yards back. Naruto was in front of him in a second, and before he could land, he brought knee to the ninja's ribs. The hit was so powerful that he heard the ninja's bones crack, and the ninjas bloodcurdling scream confirmed it. Deciding that the ninja was disposed of, he turned to look at the other three fighting with the second ninja. Kakashi flashed through some hand seals before thrusting his palm forward. A lightning bolt flew from his palm, hitting the ninja square in the chest, making him scream in pain. Gekko, taking the opportunity, ran up to the ninja, his Katana already extended, and in one clean slash, he decapitated the enemy ninja. Naruto watched as the headless body slumped to the ground, the blood quickly creating a pool around the body. The head landed in the blood pool with a disgusting splash sound. As Naruto relaxed, he heard Tazuna yell out in fear.

He turned to see the ninja he had been fighting was now flying towards Tazuna, with his clawed gauntlet extended, and ready to slice him in half. They were a short distance away from them, but there was no way that they could reach them in time. He saw Sakura flash through hand seals, as she moved in front of Tazuna, before she slammed her hands in the ground.

"Doton: Earth Cocoon!"

A giant sphere of earth covered Tazuna and Sakura, encasing them completely in solid grey rock. The enemy ninja sliced the grey earth, creating only a small slash mark, showing just how resilient the rock was. He saw the ninja stand on top of the Cocoon for a second, before he heard Sakura cry out another jutsu from inside the cocoon.

"Doton: Spike Graveyard!"

Naruto widened his eyes as giant earth spikes started rising from the cocoon. The enemy ninja, caught by surprise, didn't manage to get away in time. He was pierced right through the chest by an earth spike. The earth spike tore through his back, covered in blood. He stared wide eyed at the cocoon, as it crumbled away, to reveal an exhausted Sakura. Sakura's eyes widened as she saw the ninja's look. She slumped forward as the chakra exhaustion took its toll, and she was unconscious in seconds. The earth cocoon, crumbled away, letting the enemy ninja fall to the ground in a sickening thud. He was dead before he hit the ground.

Kakashi rushed to Sakura's aid, checking her pulse to see if she was alright. Naruto, Sasuke and Gekko, all followed suit gathering around Sakura. Gekko, who was for some reason holding the head of one of the ninja, moved to the impaled ninja, and cut his head in one slash. He then placed both the heads on top of a storage scroll, and in one single burst of chakra, the heads were sealed inside the storage scroll. He saw Naruto looking at him weirdly.

"What? They're the Demon Brothers, missing-nin from the Mist Village. They're bound to have some bounty on their heads. You should all learn this, as killing missing-nin brings in a lot of money for the villages, and for yourself." He said in a nonchalant tone.

Naruto shrugged as he turned to Kakashi, looking at him questioningly, pointing at Sakura with his eyes.

"She's fine, but she's going to need a lot of rest, her chakra reserves must be completely depleted. Naruto, can you use one of your clones to carry her once we get back on the road?" At Naruto's nod, he turned to Tazuna. "Tazuna-san, it was painfully obvious from that last attack, that their target was you all along. Now why would two C-rank missing-nin be after a simple bridge builder?" he said, using a little killing intent to push Tazuna into speaking.

Tazuna broke down right in front of them, telling them the story of how Gato got in control of the Land of Waves, and how he terrorised its people, leading them all into poverty, and how the bridge was the only hope for the Land of Waves.

"I'm sorry Tazuna-san, but I can't help you. You had two B-rank missing-nin after you, and now that they failed, Gato is bound to send someone far stronger, maybe even an A rank criminal. Me and Gekko-san could handle them just fine, but I've got three gennin with me, one is unconscious, and I am not going to risk the lives of my students. Come on guys, we are leaving." He said, turning his back on everyone. As Gekko moved to follow him, he heard Naruto speak.

"No. This is the first time we've had a difficult mission. I'm not about to abandon it Kakashi-sensei. We've got a chance to help these people, and we will!" Sasuke nodded, showing his agreement.

"And how else will we know what we're capable of, if we run at the first sight of trouble?" he added his two cents.

"Yes, but what about Sakura? Would she want to continue this mission if she knew what awaits?" he said, trying to convince them.

"You know damn well that she would punch you in the gut for trying to abandon this mission, Kakashi-sensei. I'll carry her till she gets the rest she needs, and when she wakes up she can tell you herself."

Kakashi looked at him straight in the eye, before he sighed.

"Looks like we're going to continue the mission, Tazuna-san. I don't appreciate you lying about the mission's difficulty though."

"I swear on my honour as a man, that when Wave get's back on its feet, you're going to see A rank mission payment straight from my hands!" he replied with a confident look.

Kakashi nodded before starting to walk onwards. Naruto summoned a clone to carry Sakura, and the team was back on the road once again.

* * *

><p>The team had set camp just off the side of the road, in a small clearing. They had covered about half the distance to the Land of Waves, so, without any disturbances they would probably reach the Land of Waves the following day.<p>

It was the middle of the night, and the only one awake was Naruto, who had guard shift. Kakashi and Gekko were in one tent, Sasuke and he were sleeping in the other, Tazuna had his own, a client privilege, and Sakura had her own, as she was the only girl. Naruto was sitting next to the campfire, looking at the stars while he focused chakra to enhance his senses. He was holding a small piece of wood, and he was using his wind chakra to form a blade around his finger. He was using the finger to carve the piece of wood aimlessly, aiming only to keep his hands busy. Every now and then he would turn to a nearby bush or tree, but then would look back up in the sky, when he realised it was just another forest animal.

His thoughts drifted, going from ramen, to Sakura's first kill, until he wasn't exactly sure what he was thinking about. All of a sudden, a baby fox came running out of the bush, before it ran back in as soon as it saw him. Naruto grabbed his stomach in reflex, thinking about his tenant. Even after learning about his tenant, and why people hated him so much, he hadn't given it much thought. He hadn't tried communicating with the fox yet. He had read a book about Jinchuuriki, and it stated that powerful Jinchuuriki had a powerful connection with their tenants, and the Jinchuuriki worked together with their tenants, whether by becoming friends with them, or by subduing them. He knew that it was fated that he someday had a chat with his tenant, but he wasn't going to bring that day any closer than it actually was.

As he was lost in his thoughts, he heard a noise behind him, and he instantly turned around, his ninjato already in his hand. His muscles relaxed once he saw the familiar pink hair.

"Sakura, you're up." He said with a smile. "Come here, sit. How are you feeling?" he asked her as she moved to sit beside him.

"Well, exhausted for one... but other than that, I feel fine. Is Tazuna-san okay?" she said with a weak smile. The smile however, didn't show in her eyes, and she was awkwardly using a stick to poke at the ground at her feet

"Tazuna-san is fine, but you're not fooling anyone Sakura. What's bothering you?" he said, putting his hand on her shoulder, trying to reassure her. She stopped fiddling around with the stick, her eyes growing sadder. She paused before she looked at him straight in the eye. Naruto could clearly see the sadness through her eyes, like he was peering directly in to her soul.

"I killed a man, Naruto. All the hopes he had for the future, all the experiences he had. He may have been an enemy, but for Kami's sake, he was a human being. What right do I have to just end his life?" she said, slowly tearing up. She started sobbing, burying her face in her hands. Naruto was at a loss for what to do. Acting on instinct, he stood up and pulled her into a bear hug. She buried her face in his chest, shaking as she continued crying.

"Sakura, it's our job as ninja of Konoha, and ninja in general to kill. Whether you kill to protect your mission, or killing someone IS your mission, you are bound to kill sooner or later, after becoming gennin. Just think about it. If you hadn't reacted like you did, and killed that man, He would have cut you and Tazuna-san in half. We wouldn't want that, would we?" he said in a cheerful voice, trying to cheer her up. "Killing is going to be a part of your life, whether you like it or not. Nobody calls a ninja a monster because they kill, because it is their duty. Now if you enjoy killing, that's a whole different issue. You don't enjoy killing, do you?" he mimicked his best frightened voice, making Sakura giggle slightly.

She slowly pushed away from him, looking at him with a small smile.

"Thank you Naruto, you really know how to make someone feel better, don't you?" she said, not really questioning him. "I think I'm going to go to bed now... I'll see you tomorrow morning." She finished, before turning her back on him and going back in her tent.

Naruto watched her go inside with a small smile. He was glad to see his team mate was okay, after having her first kill. He resumed his post next to the dying campfire, and turned his gaze towards the stars. His hands returned to carving the wood piece. His shift would be ending soon, and he would get a few hours of sleep before they got back on the road.

Unbeknownst to Naruto, a masked figure was looking at him, hidden in the tree branches a few trees away. A very intrigued figure indeed...

* * *

><p>The team had been on the road for a few hours now. They had already taken a silent boat trip across the large lake that separated the Land of Waves from the rest of the world, and now they were en route to Tazuna's village. Naruto noticed that the mist kept increasing the further they progressed, so he turned to Tazuna about it.<p>

"Yeah, the Land of Waves' countryside is constantly plagued by mist, making travelling to most villages a much harsher task than it actually is." He replied, looking around the mist carefully, trying to point out where they should head to.

They reached a large clearing that was strangely devoid of mist. The clearing had a small lake on one side. It looked like the lake was connected to the larger lake around the Land of Waves via a thin river. Kakashi and Gekko looked at each other before Kakashi nodded, getting the hidden message. He pushed his hitai-ate up, revealing his sharingan for the first time to his students. He looked around them carefully.

"This mist... it's chakra enlaced, this isn't normal mist..." he said, narrowing his eyes. He pushed his hitai-ate back on, covering his sharingan, as he didn't want to spend more chakra than he needed. Just as he pushed his hitai-ate down, he heard the rustling of leaves. Before he could react, Naruto had already planted several kunai to whatever was behind the bush. Using one sleek motion, he pulled the shuriken back via his chakra strings. The kunai came flying back, and a pure white rabbit was attached to them.

'At least the poor thing suffered a swift death... Wait... white fur? It's barely winter, that rabbit should be brown furred, unless it was raised indoors.' While all that held no actual meaning to Kakashi, he was sure this was part of a bigger picture. As he was about to turn his gaze back to the road, he felt a disturbance in the air around them. The tell-tale sound of metal flying through the air reached his trained ears, and by natural reflex, he dived towards Tazuna, pulling him to the ground with him.

"Everyone, DUCK!" he yelled while diving.

His team dived to the ground, barely dodging the huge blade that flew over their heads. The blade continued on its spinning path, until it lodged itself on a large tree at the other end of the clearing.

As they all got up from the ground, they turned their eyes on the tree the blade had lodged itself in. They saw a figure standing on the blade, with his back turned on them. The figure turned around, revealing a mask clad face, and demonic looking eyes. Then, a second figure flashed into view, appearing in front of the tree, before leaning on the tree behind it.

Kakashi's eyes widened, but that widening didn't match Gekko's eyes which were indeed widened, but there was another emotion flickering in them. Excitement. He opened his mouth to speak, the excitement clearly evident in his voice, despite the predicament they just found themselves in.

"Never thought i'd see the day when two of the Mist village's Seven Legendary Swordsmen appeared right before my freaking eyes!"

* * *

><p>Well, that's my shot at a 'cliffy'. Who is this second mysterious figure? Why was the masked figure so intrigued by Naruto? Tune in next time in Naruto: The Storm to find out!<p>

But in all seriousness folks, I'm really sorry for the delay, I hope this chapter makes up for it. :) Let me know what you think in a review or something :).

Oh, and to answer the eminent question, no I've got no plans for romantic interests for Naruto yet. And if I did, why would I tell you that? Wouldn't that just take out all the fun of actually reading to find out?

Peace!  
>~6Vor6kas6<p> 


	11. AN - Not a discontinuation note -

Okay, I just logged in my email account after what seemed to be ages, and saw all the emails from . I then remembered that I had an ongoing story, but to be honest, it's not so much that I forgot about it, the problem was that I was too deep in the studying hole.

This year has been the worst year of my life, in terms of studying. I have so many difficult subjects, and, because my country's system does not include A-Levels, I have some a-levels going on the side, so I can finally get out of this place.

I am so-so-so-so sorry for the year long delay, but I haven't had time to breathe here… I have one and a half months left so I can finish these damned exams and be done with studying for a whole YEAR( the way my country's system works, I got rid of all the tough subjects for next year and got a bunch of super easy ones, because I don't need the hard ones.) I am NOT discontinuing this, but I ask of you to be patient for another two months max. I couldn't leave you guys without an update, after seeing all the emails and such. Again, I am sorry for the long delay, but there was nothing that I could do about it, honestly. RL is a bitch! :)

Thanks to the people that have been checking back for an update, and I _promise_ I'll have an update ready as soon as I finish with the damned exams.

-6vor6kas6


	12. READ -- Discontinuation note I'm sorry

I am sorry, but as you have already understood, i have given up on this story. My reasons for this, other than being too bored and too busy to continue this? I have started writing my own stuff, creating my own stories, and this has already expanded my writing by a whole lot. I have not stopped writing, for any who care, but I have stopped writing fanfiction, because I see no gain in doing so.

Thank you, if you have been waiting for a new chapter, and I am sorry for this. Maybe if I ever get a novel published I'll post it on here so you guys can check it out

Cheers

~6vor6kas6


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